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Rebel Moon Part One: A Child Of Fire…
Yes, it’s taken me some time to get round to watching this, but since it wasn’t available for review prior to release, and with so much other stuff to catch up with, I figured I may as well watching it when Part 2 was due, which comes tomorrow.
We get a monologue from Anthony Hopkins, telling us how 1000 Kings have rules unchallenged with their Motherworld, but consumed everything on ther planet (got to get the ‘man destroying the planet’ narrative in there, somehow!), but a revolution was coming, and the King and Queen were killed by an assassin, with power being seized by Balisaruius (Fra Fee).
Despite all the technology in existence, Gunnar’s (Michiel Huisman) world is populated by nothing but lowly farmhands, it seems, led by their overseer, Sindri (Corey Stoll).
Because reasons, angry Cockney Atticus Noble (Ed Skrein) comes looking for soem free food, which would leave their world without much to survive, but thanks to badass Kora (Sofia Boutella), she’ll turn up to bridge the gap, help form their resistance and stop Noble from being a complete and utter dick.
Some random observations in this…
- As well as Anthony Hopkins being the narrator, it was also nice to see him play the voice of Jimmy, a robot which can carry heavy stuff, but as soon as he’s popped up, he’s off again. Bah.
- There’s some weird CGI effects in this, such as elements in the foreground like grass and buildings, which still looks slightly out of focus, as if we’re watching someone’s VR nightmare, but it’s not.
- Why is this a 15-cert when the majority of the violence is so tame? There’s a great potential action scene, 36 minutes in, when Kora gets to kick ass, but it’s basically like a PG-certificate, the way anyone who is dispatched happens just off-camera! This isn’t the first instance of such a calamity. Overall, it felt more like a 12-cert, and that’s basically what the US got with its PG-13. It’s so misleading when it feels like we’re going to get more, we don’t.
- The film features so much back-story, which takes forever to get through, and when we do get to the meat of the film, there’s very little we haven’t seen before, making the end result feel like a bad Star Wars film, but with even less plot, even if the visuals and score are often a step up from their recent offerings. I later saw that director Zack Snyder originally intended this to be part of the Star Wars universe, but Fox didn’t go for it.
- Charlie Hunnam‘s godawful Oirish accent, like he’s auditioning for a role even less convincing than the average priest in Father Ted.
- Noble spends most of his time talking to good guys, before giving them a brief lecture and then whacking their face off. Why do baddies do this all the time? The recipient isn’t going to remember it after one second! He may as well have saved a lot of time by just killing them instantly.
- Despite Gunnar being apparently so essential to his planet’s harvesting 24/7, he somehow has plenty of time to hop from planet to planet, teaming up with Kora to try and sort Noble out.
Rebel Moon Part One: A Child Of Fire is on Netflix now, but isn’t yet available to pre-order on Blu-ray or DVD.
Check out the trailer below:
Detailed specs:
Cert: 
Running time: 133 minutes
Release date: December 22nd 2023
Studio: Netflix
Aspect Ratio: 2.39:1 (Dolby Vision, RAW (8K), Anamorphic Summiscope)
Score: 3/10
Director: Zack Snyder
Producer: Wesley Coller, Eric Newman, Deborah Snyder, Zack Snyder
Screenplay: Zack Snyder, Kurt Johnstad, Shay Hatten
Music: Tom Holkenborg (Junkie XL)
Cast:
Kora: Sofia Boutella
Titus: Djimon Hounsou
Atticus Noble: Ed Skrein
Gunnar: Michiel Huisman
Nemesis: Doona Bae
Darrian Bloodaxe: Ray Fisher
Kai: Charlie Hunnam
Jimmy (Narrator): Anthony Hopkins (voice)
Tarak: Staz Nair
Sindri: Corey Stoll
Balisarius: Fra Fee
Devra: Cleopatra Coleman
Den: Stuart Martin
Hagen: Ingvar Sigurðsson
Cassius: Alfonso Herrera
The King: Cary Elwes
The Queen: Rhian Rees
Milius: E Duffy
Harmada: Jena Malone
Aris: Sky Yang
Sam: Charlotte Maggi
Princess Issa: Stella Grace
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.