The Day the Earth Stood Still is not a terrible movie; it’s just not a very good one. It’s well directed (Scott Derickson), it’s kind of well executed, and it’s incredibly well cast, which is saying something when your lead is Keanu Reeves. Yet, despite his limitations, aside from his dreadful romantic comedies, he’s not a guy that’s really ever kept anyone from seeing his films. People may mock Keanu, but nobody dislikes the man. He’s a comfortable presence, likeable almost for his lack of acting ability, and when he’s called upon to play stoic, as he was in The Matrix trilogy, and as he is here, there’s hardly an actor more capable.
It’s all he can do, people. And that signature Keanu face serves him well when he’s asked to depict an emotionless alien nonchalantly set to destroy the human race. Moreover, when you’re putting together the cast for a grim, dour, downer of a movie, you can hardly get any more grim and dour than Keanu, Jennifer Connelly, and Jon Hamm. They’re famous for their inexpressiveness, and that’s exactly what’s called for when you’re playing a scientist or an alien being trapped in the body of Keanu Reeves.
The set up to The Day The Earth Stood Still sees Helen Benson (Jennifer Connolly) called in an emergency by the US government as one of many scientists to offer their expertise as sphere-like spaceship speeds towards crashing down in Manhattan. Fearful it could cause destruction on an unprecedented scale, officials are caught off guard when it slows down and lands in Central Park.
Helen is rushed to the scene flanked by her fellow professionals and the military and on arrival, a shape comes out of the ship. When a trigger-happy soldier shoots the being, a giant robot cyclops appears to protect it by deactivating all weapons in the vicinity. When the injured form is given medical attention, an outer shell peels off to reveal a human shaped alien named Klaatu who warns there is nothing we can do to avoid some form of invasion which will threaten our existence.
The first one third of this movie is top shelf sci-fi. The enigmatic opening sequence hints at a quantum application of the entangled photons phenomenon. The pace builds as we experience the normality of Helen’s college life short-circuited by the frightening intrusion of the crisis; the Central Park landing with that instant of wrong-headed violence; and the “birthing” of Klaatu (good hard core sci-fi) all leading to the conversation mentioned above.
Fast, scary, and threatening, the action nicely sets up Klaatu’s best line. In response to Jackson’s belligerent questioning about his motives, his reply is a simple question, “Your planet?” As movies go, it ranks up there with “I’ll be back” or “I see dead people”. It seems that although the universe is large, planets with conditions that support life are rare. We humans are squatting on one of these rarities and the rest of the universe has judged our tenancy unacceptable. Helen and Klaatu ramble on about whether we can ever change our self-destructive ways and how the Earth will die unless we stop damaging it with our modern living so slowly it’s painful.
If you like sci-fi, The Day the Earth Stood Still is a must see. For those who don’t care about the genre, you could find worse ways to kill 90 minutes. Like all good sci-fi, the film takes on an imponderable - what’s our worth as a species - and tries to make the issue real enough that we must think about it. But as a significant sci-fi work, it has too many cinematic flaws. The great ones - Tardovsky’s Solaris, Spielberg’s E.T., and the overlooked Starman - all create a way to balance three things: reality as we know it, plausible scientific mystery, and compelling storytelling. When it’s done well, it’s as close as we’ll personally get to visiting the rest of the universe. The Day the Earth Stood Still loses its balance when poor storytelling mechanics fatally undermine the reality and mystery.
I gave this movie 3 star out of 5.
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