The blackout

Language : Russian

 

Year of release : 2019

 

Run time : 2h7min

 

Genre : Action / Sci-Fi

 

Cast : Pyotr Fyodorov

 

 

Power goes out all around the world, sometime in the near future ( Moscow looks very futuristic,we're not given the year,but it looks like it's in the future) and most of the people on earth die.

Only a few are left,and most of them, 140 million, are under the control of an alien who wants to destroy humanity and bring his own race to colonize earth. So he uses them as mindless drones to kill his enemies.

 

This movie is using the same idea Prometheus has,as in,humans were created from the DNA of these aliens,not to look like the aliens,but to be under their control. The aliens have powers,they can control what people hear and see,they can change their shape and can mind control people into not only doing what they want but to be like a mindless drone,a perfect slave.

One of the aliens, ID, says he wants to help humanity survive,but he might have alternate motives.

 

The leading characters are many but the movie focuses mostly on 4 of them. One of them used to be a taxi driver who takes care of his mother who has Alzheimer and to him the invasion is the best thing that happened because he feels it gave his life meaning,now working in the military.

 

Another character and maybe his love interest,is a member of the press,there to film them,and who is married but unsure if her marriage could last or is over.

 

The two other leads are the ones who go on a date right at the beginning of the movie,and who try to inflict the romance / love into the movie,but it doesn't quite work.

 

A few things bothered me :- there's this couple,Yura and the reporter, it seems they like each other, he always protects her, and then, all of a sudden,when he doesn't agree with the other lead, and fight each other, she shoots him quite a few times!It felt a scene was missing, and something happened between them,because that came out of nowhere.

- Yura was wounded a few times, but he could still walk normally and fight!

- the aliens could live for 200.000 years?!That's when they sent their ship to earth,and it's coming now, and that's how old ID is!

 

I liked the movie,but it felt somehow empty because it pretty much leaned on the action,and not so much on character development,on the character's romances and growth together as a team. By the end of the movie the leads were still unknown.

 

The acting was great,the soundtrack was amazing, the visuals were great. I recommend it.

 

Rating : Worth a watch !