If the conventional wisdom is true, and visual grandeur holds the only true currency in the theatrical experience today — with popcorn escapism seemingly the only form immune to Peak TV and the convenience of streaming — then French filmmaker Luc Besson is making the case for audiences to leave the comfort of their couches and transport themselves into the enormous universe of “Valerian And The City Of A Thousand Planets,” his latest contribution to out-sized blockbuster cinema. Besson’s also looking to unseat James Cameron for the title of grand-slam champion of epic sci-fi engineering, because in scope and scale, ‘Valerian’ is a space opera both enormously ambitious and astounding to look at.
Besson wasn’t kidding when he said ‘Valerian’ was the most expensive movie ever made in Europe. Its dazzling spectacle is never given short shrift and nearly every cent of its $200 million price tag appears to be left on screen. Immense in its conception — an astonishing galaxy that dwarfs George Lucas’ creations — ‘Valerian’ takes place centuries into the future where humans and aliens of every imaginable stripe co-habitate on Alpha, the sprawling and titular “city of a thousand planets.” Something of a socialist utopia where galaxy-wide technology, science, and culture is shared, the ever-expanding metropolis connects thousands of species to their prosperous benefit.
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Despite the potential for chaos with millions of lifeforms commingling, law and order still rules and two special operatives, the arrogant and reckless Valerian (Dane DeHaan) and the daring, but still even-keeled Laureline (Cara Delevingne) help maintain order throughout the human territories of Alpha. But a larger threat is bubbling in the underbelly of the city connected to a previously presumed extinct race of aliens, so it’s up to the special agents to solve this greater mystery and its bigger, galaxy-wide implications. Alpha and the entire multi-ethnic milieu recalls Lucas’ Coruscant from ‘Attack Of The Clones’ and the ‘Star Wars’ sequels, the cosmopolitan planet of shape and culture, but instead of cold, clinical CGI, the VFX have vastly improved by decades of technological advancement much to the filmmakers’ betterment.
Story aside, Besson’s transportive powers are remarkable. Further impressive is his ability to express idiosyncratic tendencies through the lens of a big-budgeted spectacle; this is tentpole auteurism. Like “The Fifth Element,” his previous sci-fi touchstone, Besson’s ‘Valerian’ is weird; the director’s eccentric sensibilities permeate every expensive frame and are found in the imaginative technologies and the depiction of cultural alien quirks. The world building is awe-inspiring and the visuals look both unconventional and luxuriously expensive. Unfortunately, this leaves only pennies remaining for the characters, the plot and the rest of the movie.
The character Valerian and the actor playing him do the movie and its convoluted plot no favors. Like a doofus millennial version of Keanu Reeves, the dim “hey, dude” mien and all, Valerian is cocksure to a degree that estranges the audience and DeHaan never convinces as the hero who is also something of a chauvinist cocksman. Despite her comparable inexperience, Delevingne fares better, the emotional center of a movie without much of an emotional center, but their would-be, clashing “you should be into me,” “ew, dude, no you’re so gross ” romance is ill-conceived from the jump even as love conquers all, in space, is the movie’s groanworthy theme.
If story and characters are beside the point of a construction built to marvel, their absence is still sorely felt. Besson, to some degree, recreates “The Fifth Element” so he can supercharge it on steroids, but that ‘90s sci-fi flick has endured due to its entertainingly campy self-awareness. It’s a delicious and clever little romp through sci-fi goofiness. ‘Valerian’ attempts a similarly cheeky tone at first, but this amusing tenor eventually turns melodramatic and humorless, the latter element a mortally wounding blow to Besson’s filmic personality. Crisp and diverting in its first 20 minutes, ‘Valerian’ loses steam over time too; the sprawling movie eventually lumbers on interminably (it’s 2 hrs 17 minutes, but feels much longer).
So, the premium is placed on architecture and space and the rest suffers. Besson’s obsession with celestial magnificence makes for inspired visuals to be sure, and ones that James Cameron will likely blow in a call about, but in the aggregate, it doesn’t make for a compelling movie, especially with paperweight placeholders for characters, seemingly created to prop up the gorgeous-to-look-at drapes.
Even as it delays an overstuffed narrative, ‘Valerian’ shines when it detours off course from its whodunit story. A nearly nonsensical tangent with Rihanna as a dancing shapeshifter might have almost nothing to do with the core story, but it’s a delightfully strange deviation. In fact, it makes the case for Besson to leave the action heroism to the Camerons and Lucases of the world and stick to an oddball love story stuck in the middle of his own peculiar, laser-lit “Blade Runner” universe. At least that sounds more interesting. It’s only in the movie’s red light district sequence, where Rihanna is found, that the movie starts to coalesce some admittedly thin ideas of drug-fueled ecstasy, rapturous visuals and its pedestrian notions of universal love. And while the story veers off course here, by this point, you’re taking anything you can get.
While “Valerian” and its gigantic canvas may make ‘Star Wars’ look like child’s play, the movie and its flat characters still cause one to yearn for Lucas’ fun, but stock archetypes and sometimes wooden line-readings. Besson’s dialogue is atrocious and expository scenes zip around like so many laser blasts. Even if the movie is based on an existing property – a beloved French graphic novel – as a producer and designer, Besson should be lauded; ‘Valerian’ is out of this world. But next time, he might want to reread the comic for its characters, checking the little word bubbles to see if there’s actually something there. Ultimately, Besson is an amazing emissary to the stars, and his radiant vessel might compel you to leave your home, but at the not-so-outer-edges of his cosmos you’ll discover empty awe and wonder is all he’s got. [C]