Elevation
review by Bobby Blakey
Director George Nolfi has had some interesting films in his resume including The Adjustment Bureau and Birth of the Dragon. In 2020 he teamed up with Anthony Mackie for the film The Banker and now they are reuniting for the post-apocalyptic sci-fi film Elevation co-starring Morena Baccarin, Maddie Hasson, and Danny Boyd Jr. Could this film offer up something worth fighting for or should it just stay up high and away from the masses?
Elevation follows a single father, and two women venture who from the safety of their homes to face monstrous creatures to save the life of a young boy in the post-apocalyptic Rocky Mountains.
I’ve been a fan of Mackie long before he stepped into the MCU and always happy to see him in different gernes. I think this was a good starring vehicle for him offering up the drama and the action with both he is more than skilled at. The film delivers a decent enough action sci-fi piece but struggles to find its way out of the generic category which isn’t always a bad thing but had hoped for so much more.
The story is simple with just enough explanation to get things going, but also enough questions to keep you interested. The biggest issue here though is that there are a lot of holes in the idea, which is good, but doesn’t always make sense. The way the creatures hunt and attack humans but not the animals doesn’t make any sense since they produce the way they track them the same. I don’t’ want to give it away, but it is one of those things I guess we are just supposed to let go of danger affecting humans, but they go out of their way to show how many animals are running free and not being targeted.
They seemed to play it safer than they needed to be with an R rating. Outside of
the language there isn’t much here to really justify it and with the action and situation could have been a great time to fully embrace its rating for more. The cast all do a good job with what they are working with and make for a film that walks right in the line of being something that could have been cool, but never fully finds its real pacing and execution.
The creatures are cool enough but seem familiar more than original like I had hoped. How they hunt, attack and defend helps to make them a bit more than they might have otherwise with a design that is a mix of cool and average all at once. Believe it or not I didn’t hate this movie and actually found it quite entertaining, but I also could see so much more potential for it. It might have worked better as a TV series in its final execution as it even ends letting us know there is more to come, but will we ever get it? Thankfully it works still whether that follow-up comes or not.
Decide for yourself and check out Elevation in theaters now from Vertical.