Young Ones is almost completely devoid of a story despite it’s 100 minute running time. What seemed like a promising entry into the Sci-Fi Western genre, despite some flashes of quality, ultimately disappoints. It’s supposed to be some somber rumination on innocence lost, but no, this isn’t a good film. I was drawn in by a very visually arresting trailer and involvement by some quality actors. Michael Shannon’s involvement is usually a stamp of approval for any film or TV show. At times he was the best part of Boardwalk Empire. He also has great indie films to his credit, like Shotgun Stories, Revolutionary Road, Take Shelter and The Iceman. Even his General Zod in Man of Steel was a bright spot in an otherwise complete misfire. His character here might have been the most interesting out of the bunch, but as he’s only in less than half of the film it’s not enough of a saving grace. You can tell that Shannon gives it his all, he goes full bore into every role. Nicholas Hoult’s villain’s motivations are as sparse as the landscape and there’s not much of a place for him to pull his performance from. He is best known for his role as Hank McCoy/Beast in X-Men: First Class and X-Men: Days of Future Past. He did good work in those blockbuster appearances and I don’t think he’s necessarily to blame for the failings of this picture, but he just did not show up.
Elle Fanning (Somewhere, Twixt, Maleficent) plays Shannon’s daugther and Kodi Smit-McPhee his son. Their relationships are all strained, but very little explanation is given at the outset and no reveal occurs at the end. The world has suffered some sort of climate catastrophe and a mountain state in the USA is suffering severe draught. Shannon’s character has decided to tough it out. The landscape shots are dealt with nicely, but that’s not the challenge in a movie like this. It’s odd what parts of society are left standing and what has crumbled. The technology used is interesting at times but more could’ve been dealt with how they obtain water and the desperation for it. The film echoes superior films in the genre, namely Mad Max and the recent The Rover. It also calls to the Tatooine scenes in Star Wars and even now the earthbound scenes in Interstellar. It all reminds you of better movies and that you spent your time re-watching those instead. I assume this is where director Jake Paltrow, (yes, brother of Gwyneth Paltrow), pulled his inspiration, along with countless more tradition revenge based westerns. But he did not pull enough because the story is just too sparse. I am a fan of slower movies with less exposition, but this is just too much. Some of the edits used, a lot of slow fades, seemed jarring in the context. It reminds you how much editing now is just cuts from one thing to another. I could appreciate the use of fades more, but here it is just overused.
I think Paltrow’s aesthetics are on point and could serve him well in future movies. But sometimes a movie is released to iTunes alone for a reason. I had a credit so I thought I’d take a chance on this. It was interesting in places, but those places just weren’t explored enough. Paltrow has proven himself with directing episodes of Boardwalk Empire (presumably where he got Michael Shannon to sign onto this) so his talent is not to just be discarded. I’d like to see him work off another’s written material as it seems the screenplay was the biggest issue by far. Not a complete disaster, but not good. I usually pride myself on picking good movies to watch, but I missed the mark here.
midwestmovieman 