Director of sci-fi cult classic The Fifth Element Luc Besson returns with a fresh space opera. Craving original blockbuster stories, I hoped Valerian would be great. I really hoped. I really… hoped… oh god this film is bad.
Valerian depicts a future where humans, and thousands of alien species, have constructed an enormous, diverse space-city. When a threat emerges that threatens its destruction, it’s up to agents Valerian (Dane DeHaan) and his partner Laureline (Cara Delevingne) to save the day.
Where to begin. The intro sequence is cool. It shows the ISS incrementally growing, with representatives from various countries (and eventually aliens) adding modules, until after centuries it has become a sprawling city. Women are starkly absent from all of these encounters so I guess in four hundred years we still haven’t sorted that out.
Next, we meet the aliens from Avatar. I mean, they’re blue, tall, have sparkly faces, and are in tune with nature, so yeah. Alarm bells ring here. Though their beach is idyllic – golden sands, sapphire seas, lizards with no regard for thermodynamics that eat pearls and poo out more pearls (seriously) – I never got lost in it. More on that later, because we’re about to meet our hero, and it’s all downhill from here.
I like Dane DeHaan. If you’ve seen The Place Beyond the Pines or even Chronicle you know he can act. But he’s totally miscast here. It doesn’t help that Valerian is an arsehole but for a lady-killing super-agent, DeHaan brought no convincing charisma or confidence to the role. Meanwhile, Cara Delevingne is fine. Just fine. I wish they hired an actress, but she did fine.
What isn’t fine is their “romance”. No exaggeration, this is the most artificial, awkward on-screen romance since Hayden “I don’t like sand” Christensen and Natalie “I truly, deeply, love you” Portman. Devoid of chemistry, our leads blunder through “banter” never showing any plausible reason for their attraction. They fail to establish that they’re even a couple before Valerian proposes in the first act!
It’s offensive. Plenty of films have reinforced the damaging stereotype: Men, if you’re rude and manipulative with a woman long enough, she’ll bang you. Valerian goes a step further and claims she’ll actually fucking marry you.
The script doesn’t help – one of the worst that’s made it to screen in a long time. Relentlessly unfunny, laughably poor dialogue punctuates every scene, while frequent exposition dumps drain all wonder and pace from the story. Writing 101: Show, don’t tell. How do we learn how much Valerian fancies Laureline? Valerian tells us. How do we learn Valerian has commitment issues? Laureline tells us. How do we learn the city’s economy has suffered the last year? The frigging ship tells us.
Perhaps the saddest part is that the story has some good intentions. An alien race loses their planet due to a war they have no part in, echoing the current refugee crisis. Sadly, the complicated, morally grey situation is told through black-and-white characters, and falls flat. But not before an unintentionally hilarious “plot twist” sequence.
It plays out like a shocking revelation, but unless Valerian is literally the first film you’ve ever seen (in which case, I’m so sorry it had to be this), you won’t be surprised by any of it. Bad guy is bad. Nature-loving aliens are good. Valierian is a prick. We get it. And it goes on and on over-explaining until it becomes funny.
The whole plot feels like they made up while shooting. A recent interview with Besson is revealing. He asked thousands of designers to submit drawings without reading the script, then he picked his favourites: “…sometimes they would bring a drawing that was so amazing that I would change the script, to use the idea that was in the drawing.” And it shows.
An entire sequence takes place because Laureline is accidentally reeled up into a dangerous zone by fishing aliens. All she does it wait for her man to rescue her – urgh. It’s a complex situation, see, because slight interference with these aliens might cause diplomatic unrest. Yet, in the end, there are no consequences for killing dozens of them and beheading their emperor.
Then there’s the icing on the cake of a thousand flaws: Rihanna shows up as an alien called Bubble (seriously). The film stops dead while she has a dance scene. Just her. On stage. With a pole. Dancing to music for a good few minutes. She asks Valerian if he liked her performance. He speaks the minds of everyone in the audience when he literally responds: “It was cool, but I’ve got other things on my mind right now.”
Some of it is cool. There are a few creative set pieces throughout, particularly one innovative action scene set in a market in another dimension. But as pretty as it looks I was never immersed. One reason was that, unusually, Valerian suffers from stale sound design. That serene beach I talked about earlier? There’s barely a noise as the sea laps the sand. Guns fizzle and pop but never thunder or bang. It all felt hollow, sterile, a constant reminder that all events are orchestrated in front of a green screen.
Even with a bit of creativity sprinkled here and here, nothing can make up for its atrocious dialogue, silted romance, and predictable story that beats you over the head trying to surprise you. They should have called it valerian root – it’ll only function as a sleep-aid.
All image credit: Cineuropa.
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