Movies…with a little bit of obscure culture and sports mixed in
Rebel Moon – Part One: A Child of Fire was meant to be a Star Wars movie. Snyder pitched it to LucasFilm as such, but they turned it down. He took his vision and made it a science fiction franchise of his own. Unfortunately, not everyone can be George Lucas.
“When a peaceful settlement on the edge of a distant moon finds itself threatened by the armies of a tyrannical ruling force, a mysterious stranger living among its villagers becomes their best hope for survival.”
Director: Zack Synder
Writers: Zack Snyder, Kurt Johnstad, Shay Hatten
Stars: Sofia Boutella, Djimon Hounsou, Ed Skrein, Michiel Huisman, Charlie Hunnam, Anthony Hopkins, Cary Elwes
Release: December 15, 2023
IMDB
Zack Snyder, you should no longer get the green light to work whatever projects you want. Sorry, but you’ve lost the right to the benefit of the doubt. Rebel Moon – Part One: A Child of Fire (2023) is a science fiction epic that has no sense of self. It has desires to be something grandiose, but in reality, it’s a simple impersonation of something that was created in a galaxy far, far away.
Rebel Moon – Part One: A Child of Fire was meant to be a Star Wars movie. Snyder pitched it to LucasFilm as such, but they turned it down. He took his vision and made it a science fiction franchise of his own. Unfortunately, not everyone can be George Lucas.
The rebellious story of underdogs taking down an evil empire begins on a farm planet where Kora (Sofia Boutella) is a diligent worker and a stranger amongst the locals. Things are going well for the natives and Kora, even under the dictatorship rule of the power-hungry former senator and now tyrant Balisarius. The winds of change gust violently when the dastardly Atticus Noble (Ed Skrein) lands in the village on Veldt. Noble is in charge of ending all rebellions in the outer realm, and his main mission is hunting down a pair of rebel leader siblings, Devra (Cleopatra Coleman) and Darrian Bloodaxe (Ray Fisher).
Noble begins a dialogue with Veldt leader Sindri (Corey Stoll), but it goes sour quickly when he puts a bullet in his head. Gunnar (Michiel Huisman) now becomes the de facto head of the village, yet his quiet mannerisms don’t give the people much hope. When Noble departs, the stress of the situation becomes apparent with soldiers and robots being left behind to carry out Noble’s will.
Kora wants to flee the village, but the sight of some imperial soldiers about to sexual assault a young village girl pushes Kora in a different direction. One of extreme violence. Turns out Kora has some kick-ass fighting skills and she shows them off by killing nearly every soldier left behind by Noble. The village is both unlifted and scared by the protective slayings and now Kora has inserted herself into the narrative. She warns the village that if they don’t stand up and fight against Noble and the empire, then they will most certainly be wiped out without mercy.
It’s at this point when Kora and Gunnar begin a team-up movie. The two depart for a port in Providence in hopes of following clues towards a disgraced Imperium general by the name of Titus (Djimon Hounsou). Kora is connected to this man because she was once a soldier under his command. Through an expository dump we learn that Kora became an officer and fought under the flag of the nation that killed her family. Through years of excellence she became a bodyguard to the Motherworld princess Issa (Stella Grace Fitzgerald), but failure in this task resulted in her having a crisis of faith.
Gunnar and Kora meet a smuggler character by the name of Kai (Charlie Hunnam) who agrees to take them on his ship to look for Titus. While on the way towards the final destination, the troupe of rabble rousers expands to include an animal tamer Tarak (Staz Nair), and sword-wielding killer by the name of Nemesis (Doona Bae). The group arrives at a gladiatorial moon setting where Titus has chained himself to the bottle. The drunken former leader of the Eastern Forces agrees to join Kora and company on the promise he can avenge his former soldier’s death.
The group of rag-tag then meet up with Devra and Darrian looking to have the duo join their rebellious cause. Darrian sees an alignment in their goals and joins the crew, and so it would appear that the science-fiction version of the Magnificent Seven is ready to return to Veldt to defend it from Noble and the Imperium. Unluckily for Kora and company, the meetup with Noble comes a bit earlier than they would have expected. A betrayal within the group (in a cloud city, yes that obvious) leads to a climactic fight where the heroes must fight together for the first time in order to survive before their true adventure has even begun.
The ending of Rebel Moon – Part One: A Child of Fire ends with the good guys retaining hope, and the bad guys needing to lick their wounds. There is a direct homage to Darth Vader with a villain being reborn into something different, and an overlord who instills fear in both the haves and have-nots is formally introduced.
Rebel Moon – Part One: A Child of Fire is a big steaming pile of dog shit. It is a steaming pile of dog shit desperate to be appreciated for something that it isn’t. The movie is trying to hard to pay homage to its inspiration that it forgets to be something on its own.
Shall we list off some of the Star Wars traits that are littered throughout Rebel Moon – Part One: A Child of Fire?
Rebel Moon – Part One: A Child of Fire is like a younger sibling dressing up in all their older siblings clothes. Nothing fits right and everything has stains on it. The shoes are too big and the entire journey is plotting like a drunk mime wobbling on cobblestone streets.
Does it ever get hard for the Synder crew to stick up for their man? Not every movie the man makes can have a Snyder cut. Sometimes you need to put forth a good movie on the first go around. In all honesty, the last movie of Snyder’s I would whole-heartedly recommend is Watchmen which came out in 2009. Sucker Punch (2011) was a disappointment and Man Of Steel (2013) made me very angry. Batman v Superman: Dawn Of Justice (2016) had one of the most idiotic endings ever, and then Justice League (2017) failed on its grand mission.
Now if we are being fair, Zack Snyder’s Justice League (2021) was better than it ought to have been, but it’s also understandable that such a viewing experience was not made for a movie theater experience. A four hour movie is fucking longgggg, and for a movie that won’t bring any awards, it’s not worth it for nearly any studio.
A few years ago Synder made Army Of The Dead (2021) for Netflix. It was his first film made on digital, and it was the first time I watched a Synder original release and didn’t have a bad time. Is the movie good? No. But is it reprehensibly bad? No, not that either. Netflix must have been happy because they gave Snyder free reign with Rebel Moon – Part One: A Child of Fire. Was letting Synder go running without a leash a good idea? It doesn’t seem so.
According to Forbes, A Child Of Fire ranked ninth out of Netflix’s original films. It ranked below critically acclaimed films like The Killer (2023) and Leave The World Behind (2023), as well as equally panned stories like Heart Of Stone (2023). The Snyder name is meant to bring in viewers and keep them engaged with the streaming platform. Rebel Moon doesn’t have the talent cache around it because Synder himself is the draw. Being ninth on the list may not be deemed a massive failure, but it’s fair to say the number is a disappointment.
Despite the struggles inside and outside the movie, there are some not terrible things in the movie.
Ed Skrein is pretty damn enjoyable as Atticus Noble. The man normally plays an asshole, and this time he is donned in all gray and wearing a fancy hat. The character is an asshole and a ruthless one at that. The killing of Sindri is a great moment that infuses the movie with hope, a hope that it will be different. This killing is probably an instrumental part rated R cut that Synder is promising, but even in the PG-13 version its effecting.
Perhaps Skrein is able to thrive because evil for evil’s sake is the basest thing that science fiction epics need. You need the pitch black foil that white hope can lasso itself around. The character of Atticus Noble serves his purpose well in Rebel Moon – Part One: A Child of Fire.
In regards to other positive traits, Sofia Boutella looks and plays the part of Kora well. She is able to do the action while carrying a proper air of mystique. When she is asked to story dump, just don’t hold it against her because she is simply reading what the script is telling her to do. Boutella has the physicality for action films. She has the young Mill Jovovich energy that’s exciting to watch and believable.
And Charlie Hunnam knows how to play dastardly daredevils well. He has the charisma and a smirk to charm the wits off of anyone. He may be a little bit of a one trick pony (I have not seen Sons Of Anarchy so don’t sue me), and that’s okay. He knows his role well.
Kai is the classic member of the adventure team-up force. The rest of the crew is a mixed back of poor introductions and attempts at genre twisting. Tarak gets the Western introduction breaking in an animal and having a Native American approach. Nemesis battles a creature in what attempts to be a moral dilemma in what is a Blade Runner-esq noir introduction. Both of these introductions are lackluster and are made for YouTube clip watching as much as cinematic storytelling
Djimon Hounsou plays the part of General Titus, and damn has Djimon had a very busy 2023. The man has a tough run of superhero and science fiction luck with Black Adam (2022), Shazam! Fury Of The Gods (2023) and Rebel Moon – Part One: A Child of Fire. The actor who was outstanding in Gladiator (2000) and Blood Diamond (2006) has been in the furious action, science fiction, super-hero, heavy CGI travel car for a while now. Hounsou is making bank, but let’s get the man more roles grounded in reality.
Speaking of cashing checks, how about Anthony Hopkins getting in some voice work as the robot Jimmy. The machines are used as target practice and emotional punching bags by Noble’s men on Veldt and Jimmy is the voice of the bots. He has a conversation with a child where a floral crown is passed back and forth as a token of peace.
Here is the thing, I don’t empathize with robots. I struggle with it during Star Wars films, so trying to garner any sort of emotion for non-alive things is going to be a tough bargain in this Rebel Moon universe. One is never upset to see Hopkins voice, but one can be very surprised to have his presence in a movie like this.
Hopkins and everyone involved is going to continue cashing checks because there are going to be numerous more Rebel Moon films. Rebel Moon – Part Two: The Scargiver (2024) is all set to come out in April 2024, and there are potential sequels and spin-offs that can happen. Snyder has plans for this universe to not only expand on the screen, but also through video games, books and graphic novels. Synder thinks he has a great juggernaut of a universe on his hands. The struggle and fact of the matter is that Netflix can toss all future plans in the fire if The Scargiver doesn’t deliver the goods.
Will it? Absolutely, not. Well I shouldn’t say absolutely because I can’t predict the future, but based on A Child Of Fire, it’s all going to be Synder spindling his silly shit and then saying there are alternative versions that are better. It’s become a rinse, wash, repeat gameplan.
Something that doesn’t need repeating is a viewing of Rebel Moon – Part One: A Child of Fire. If you haven’t seen it yet, toss it on Netflix, but if you have, give me one good reason why I should be excited.
STANKO RATING: D
Post bog note here. I was watching Mad Max: Fury Road (2015) when I was jotting down my notes on Rebel Moon – Part One: A Child of Fire. You want to talk about two different types of movies…George Miller created a fast-twitched uncomplicated back-and-forth action ride with little exposition while Zack Synder gets off on slow-motion and over-stuffing his plot. One movie is an all-time action classic, and the other is not.
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