Tomorrowland

This review may contain spoilers!

A wacky and strange film that doesn't seem to know if it's a mature film or a family film. I would give Tomorrowland a 6.5/10.

This film had some fun special effects, by fun I mean they created a film with some very weird or odd animation to create a modern family film. The cinematography within this film was also something to be admired, they were a lot of shots that celebrated the world they were creating within the film itself. Beyond that the film was grounded in some great themes, that used the platform of family film to be able to deliver it in an effective way to a diverse scope of age ranges.

George Clooney, who played Frank Walker, really did a great job as this begrudging mentor figure; while he certainly didn't pull out all the stops in this film he was absolutely a strong lead. Raffey Cassidy, who played Athena, was a true stand out performance in this film; I'd say very few child actors can say they did better than Clooney but in my books she sure can. Keegan-Michael Key, who played Hugo, was one of the funniest cameos of the film; his grandiose entry turning to a very terrifying robot attack was one of the better parts of the film.

However the best performance of the film came from Hugh Laurie, who played Nix. Laurie excelled in his role as an antagonist; delivering one of the best monologues I've heard from an antagonist in a family film. To trump this Laurie fleshed out a character of intelligence and principles who really had quite a realistic impact upon the film.

This film suffered from a plot that was a bit confused; it grew complicated and had an aggravating number of plot holes. It was hard to engage with the story or find points to emphasise with, this grew out of a story that had a lot of jargon and world building. In fact it had a bit too much of these things and as such I'd go so far as to say that Tomorrowland was a film that dragged. The musical score felt way too light and had very little impact.

Britt Robertson, who played Casey Newton, was an awful lead; she tended to exaggerate her emotions and she downplayed her role to be quite uninteresting when the role was in fact pivotal to the film. Kathryn Hahn, who played Ursula, was the let down cameo of the film; in fact she did a lot to undermine the great parts of Key's performance. Thomas Robinson, who played Young Frank Walker, felt very bland in how he delivered his dialogue. Pierce Gagnon, who played Nate Newton, was a very two dimensional character and performance; he didn't have any chemistry with any other actor of the film.