Python Hyena
City of Ember (2008): Dir: Gil Kenan / Cast: Harry Treadaway, Saoirse Ronan, Bill Murray, Tim Robbins, Martin Landau: Stunning futuristic adventure displays a decaying underground society. Mankind is forced to progress underground for 200 years. A box contains the count down and instructions on how to surface. This box is passed down from Mayor to Mayor with instructions given but the last Mayor died suddenly leaving everything forgotten. Harry Treadaway accepts a job on the pipeline in hopes of locating the failing generator. He is joined by Saoirse Ronan whose grandfather was the last Mayor to obtain the box. They had originally swapped jobs to further their talents but as time runs out they grow closer to figuring out a way to escape the city. Bill Murray plays current Mayor who is stealing food and making false promises. The consequences for this arrive at the mutation of the normal. Tim Robbins plays Treadaway's inventor father who is too busy yet has ideas. He will soon have to listen to his son's facts about above ground. Martin Landau plays a mentor to Treadaway who also works in the pipe areas. This should appeal to family audiences looking for adventure as director Gil Kenan delivers on inventive ideas to this underrated film. Good clean fun full of visual spectacular, which prevents the film from decaying like Ember itself. Score: 10 / 10
rajatdahiyax
City of Ember is a 2008 British-Irish-American science fiction fantasy film based on the 2003 novel The City of Ember by Jeanne DuPrau. It was directed by Gil Kenan from a screenplay by Caroline Thompson, and stars Saoirse Ronan, Harry Treadaway, Bill Murray, Mackenzie Crook, Martin Landau, Mary Kay Place, Toby Jones and Tim Robbins. It was released in October 2008, just two months after the release of the final book in the series; The Diamond of Darkhold. For generations, the people of the City of Ember have flourished in an amazing world of glittering lights. But Ember's once powerful generator is failing... and the great lamps that illuminate the city are starting to flicker. Now, two teenagers in a race against time, must search Ember for clues that will unlock the ancient mystery of the city's existence, and help the citizens escape before the lights go out forever.
Lomedin
Unfortunately, this film has been released too late. There's nothing wrong with it: decent acting, OK story, nice fxs... However, while watching it, I had this sense of deja-vu, like I had gone through parts of this film before, like it has been done in other movies. As a film on its own, I would give it a 6, 6.5. We live in a world full of experiences that are not separated from each other, and shouldn't be, and so I can't simply ignore the fact that there's a little spark of originality missing here. Still, much more than in most of Hollywood and indie produced films nowadays. That said, you will probably guess the ending right from the beginning.Bottom line: entertaining. Not enough to keep it on your shelves.
Andrew Huggett
I really enjoyed this film – it had a fairly interesting and original idea that of a disaster befalling mankind and the only escape was to construct a sort of generational enclosed underground city (similar to the idea of a generational spaceship travelling from a polluted earth to find a new earth) but then the purpose is forgotten over time. In this case the power is running out and there's a corrupt Mayor (played by Bill Murray) with his evil sidekick played by the splendid Toby Jones. Over time the instructions for exiting the city are lost and forgotten. Martin Landau also makes a cameo appearance. The production design of the retro underground city and its associated (very analog) technology is believable and excellent. There is a strong emphasis on engineering and mechanics rather than computers and software which when you want something to last 200 years makes sense with a small enclosed population which needs to self- sustain itself with limited resources and which is in a back-to basics de-evolving state. Very good – but as with 'When Worlds Collide' (1951), 'Logan's Run' (1976) and 'THX 1138' (1971) I would have liked to have seen more of the 'new world' and the way in which our protagonists adapt (or fail to adapt) to it. There's a nice (predictable) sunrise scene at the end of the film which I was fully expecting.
AD
