Courtesy of Warner Bros.
Rated: PG-13
Starring: Mila Kunis and Channing Tatum
Directed by Lana and Andy Wachowski
How often do you have a big-budget, multiplex film with a female protagonist who spends her days scrubbing toilets? Or a male protagonist who is an albino genetic splice between human and lycan DNA? Such is the case with Jupiter Ascending, the controversial new film by the Wachowski siblings.
Jupiter Jones (Mila Kunis) never met her English father, Maximilian (James D’Arcy), an astronomer gunned down by mobsters before she was born. Born in the hold of a steamer crossing the Atlantic, her Russian mother, Aleksa (Maria Doyle Kennedy), named her daughter after her deceased husband’s favorite planet.
Fast forward a few decades. Jupiter is an undocumented alien, living with her multi-generational Russian émigré family in Chicago. She has the thankless job of cleaning the homes of wealthy homeowners and has no inkling of the pivotal role that she will play in the Earth’s future.
One day, she is donating eggs at a fertility clinic to raise a little extra cash. Suddenly, the staff are revealed as strange looking creatures from a different planet. They aren’t trying to salvage her eggs, but to kill her.
Just in time, Caine Wise (Channing Tatum), a bad-ass action figure wearing anti-gravity boots, shows up. Though severely outnumbered, he manages to save Jupiter from certain death. He turns out to be a genetically engineered mutant, who bears both human and wolf genetic material. Unfortunately, Caine was dismissed as a Legionnaire for attacking a member of his world’s privileged elite.
Caine explains that he has a chance to redeem himself if he can save Jupiter. However, Jupiter protests that it must be a case of mistaken identity. She is a total nobody. Why would anyone care about her?
Jupiter Ascending repudiates the prevailing notion of human evolution. As Caine explains to an incredulous Jupiter, humans actually originated in a different galaxy more than three billion years ago. The rulers decided to seed other planets throughout the multiverse with the human species. These humanoid transplants are unaware that their ancestors arose on a different planet altogether. They are also oblivious to what their purpose is in the overall scheme of things.
In fact, these humans on other planets are being raised to be harvested—their essence extracted and used as a life-extending elixir for the privileged members on the home planet.
By some sort of fluke, Jupiter has the exact same genetic code as the murdered matriarch of the Abrasax family, the most powerful in the multiverse. By the arcane inheritance laws, Jupiter can claim the property of her genetic analogue. That would make her the owner of the planet earth and in position to prevent the Earth from being harvested.
I was not an admirer of the Wachowski’s Matrix Trilogy. For me, V for Vendetta was plagued with iconographic and narrative problems. Speed Racer and Cloud Atlas were unmitigated disasters. With this in mind, I was taken aback by my enthusiasm for the exceptionally ambitious Jupiter Ascending. It is a conceptually provocative treatise on our genetic destiny and its mutability. The film also limns the theme of class-consciousness. Admittedly, on occasion, the narrative becomes convoluted and difficult to follow.
The film boasts a strong cast. As an everyday girl abruptly catapulted into the status of royalty, Kunis captures her character’s understandable sense of befuddlement and disorientation. Tatum once again displays his consummate athleticism as an action hero.
Even the film’s detractors will be forced to acknowledge its remarkable production values. Jupiter Ascending eschews the futuristic visual motifs of most sci-fi films. Instead, the extraterrestrial scenes adopt an aesthetic that evokes medieval Europe.
The Wachowskis have never been noted for a sense of humor. However, Jupiter Ascending has a hilarious parody of the frustrations of dealing with bureaucracy. It is an obvious homage to Brazil. Sharp-eyed viewers might recognize Brazil’s director Terry Gilliam in a cameo role.
