Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets

[areaseven]

Twenty years ago, French director Luc Besson (Nikita, Leon: The Professional) gave us The Fifth Element, which was actually a good sci-fi film not made in Hollywood. On July 21, 2017, he'll give us Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, a theatrical adaptation of the popular French sci-fi comic book series Valérian and Laureline (which was one of the inspirations for The Fifth Element). The film stars Dane DeHaan (Andrew in Chronicle, Harry Osborn in The Amazing Spider-Man 2), Carla Delevingne (Enchantress in Suicide Squad), Clive Owen (Dwight in Sin City, Mr. Smith in Shoot 'Em Up), Rihanna (overrated pop singer who helped sink Battleship), Kris Wu (some Chinese singer, as these films must somehow appeal to the Chinese market), John Goodman (Hound in Transformers: Age of Extinction, Fred in The Flintstones), Ethan Hawke (Vincent/Jerome in Gattaca, Jesse in Before Sunrise/Sunset/Midnight), and Rutger Hauer (Roy Batty in Blade Runner, Cardinal Roark in Sin City).

Will it be as good as The Fifth Element, or will it be Jupiter Ascending bad? Only time will tell.

Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets @ IMDb

[areaseven]

On a side note, Valerian and Laureline was adapted into an anime by Satelight less than a decade ago, before Macross Frontier was released.

[electric indigo]

The graphic novels actually had good plots, but judging form the trailer, this is more at home in the mindless action fun department. Like the 5th Element, it does have Besson's charm, though.

[TangledThorns]

Looks great! Nice to see big sci-fi movies outside of Star Wars/Trek.

[Dobber]

Very cool!

Chris

[Dynaman]

Bad trailer but might be a good film. If the trailer were an FX highlight reel it would be good - but as a hook for watching a movie it left me not caring at all.

[Ignacio Ocamica]

I liked the trailer! Great visuals.

[spanner]

Trailer looked ok. I absolutely loved 5th Element so I'm definitely looking forward to seeing this!

[Sildani]

Need Ruby Rhod to make a cameo.

[Graham]

Fifth Element was 20 years ago???!!!! Frak, I'm getting old

[electric indigo]

Still a pretty nonsensical trailer, but the visuals are great, even more so if you read a lot of french SF comics in the 80s.

[hachi]

I liked The Fifth Element. I'm gonna watch this, then maybe get the comics later.

[seti88]

 TOTALLY IN TO SEE THIS IN 3D.

[Dobber]

I think this looks great! I hope it won't turn out to be another Jupiter Ascending.

Chris

[Dynaman]

Much better 2nd trailer.  This film might just make my watch at the theater list.

[derex3592]

Visuals look stunning.  Luc Besson is a good director, loved Leon: The Professional and 5th Element -- might see this in IMAX. 

[Black Valkyrie]

 

 

[hachi]

Rewatched The Fifth Element, and pre-ordered the comics.

Also, I find the interview in the article below funny.

http://comicbook.com/movies/2017/05/01/new-valerian-and-the-city-of-a-thousand-planets-image-released/

Edited May 6, 2017 by hachi
Edited link

[hachi]

On 06/05/2017 at 7:32 PM, Black Valkyrie said:

 

 

I just got my copy of Valerian The Complete Collection Volume 1, and these comparison pictures were also there. Nice big book, liked the color schemes of the comic. Unfortunately I'm not too inclined to get the other volumes as the exchange rates are awful for me at the moment. If I'm lucky the local book store might carry the rest.

[sh9000]

 

[Falcon]

I really hope this one does well. Would love to see more of Valerian in the future.

 

Worried about the marketing though. Not sure it'll pull enough people to make it a qualified hit. Hope I'm proven wrong.

[chyll2]

If the reviews are good. I'll watch it. I don't know anything about it and currently, I don't get the marketing for it.

[seti88]

Neca is on it!

 

[spanner]

going to see this on the weekend with the gf. I'm really hoping its not crap! The previews looked good! I really like Cara Delevingne! 

[sh9000]

The figures look nice.

[Falcon]

3 hours ago, spanner said:

going to see this on the weekend with the gf. I'm really hoping its not crap! The previews looked good! I really like Cara Delevingne! 

It's out in Oz already? For some reason I can't watch it till 10 August! 

[spanner]

5 hours ago, Falcon said:

It's out in Oz already? For some reason I can't watch it till 10 August! 

nope.. I was mistaken..  

it is indeed the 10th of August. 

[hachi]

It was already out yesterday in the Philippines. I couldn't get out of work early so I'll have to try watch it tomorrow.

[Roy Focker]

First learn about this movie last week in a trailer before Spider-Man started.   Had no idea of the properties long history.  My thought during the trailer was is this some teen actor movie for teens based on a young adult novel?   The 2 leads look so young.  

[Dynaman]

Not a good sign that the first review I saw for it is absolutely brutal.

[Gabe Q]

It's a stinker. I saw it last night. Beautiful visuals but cheesy dialogue. My gf was wanting to like this movie so bad and she was really disappointed. 

[hachi]

I saw it today. Good visuals but I'm not satisfied with the flow of things. They should have started the movie to when Valerian met Laureline. Even though I had read the first few issues of the comics looking at it objectively it was not easy to follow. I would probably have been confused if I didn't know what Valerian was all about. The leads were OK, I liked Cara better though. As for Rihanna, hhmm, Chris Tucker was more entertaining.

Anyway, at certain times in the movie, I would think, yeah, The Fifth Element was better. Sorry Luc, better luck next time.

Edit: Yeah it's not great but is not Jupiter Ascending bad. With JA I was waiting for the movie to mercifully end and not waste any more of my time.

Edited July 22, 2017 by hachi
added stuff

[jenius]

I don't get out to too many movies these days but I saw it and here's my review:

It's not a great film but it's not bad either. The world building is awesome as are the visuals. Character design is amazing and there are some really unique and fun aliens and alien interactions.The interdimensional bits are fun and very creative. The environments are beautiful. There is a ham-fisted bit of narration at one point in order to describe the city. Like literally "Computer, tell me about the city" and then you get a couple minutes of a computer describing the sections of the city. It felt very forced for the viewer's sake. 

The plot is overly simple and there's no real twists as everything is pretty obviously telegraphed. Things that look like bad guys are bad guys. People who at first blush seem like bad guys are bad guys. Things that seem suspicious are definitely going to play into the trap and the trap is obviously a trap. Since it's so obvious where everything is going there's less drama to the large action sequences. 

I think the biggest sin though are the protagonists and I'm not sure if it was how they were written or acted. The male lead seems like he's supposed to be some sort of kick butt hero type but he just never SEEMED to be. He's a playboy? Really? I think for his character the problem is both casting and writing. The romance is never anything more than awkward and at the end makes no sense. The film honestly feels like it would have worked better with two competing super hero types rather than a simpy guy begging a girl to marry him (or maybe an Ash type doing the "you know you want to kiss me" routine). If the other characters played up Valerian being a super soldier more then they also could have played up Laureline's always taking a back seat to him as more of an issue. There are a few scenes that seem like they would have worked much better if the protagonists were reversed. The girl seems stilted for the most part rather than sassy. Bubble comes too far too fast. 

Now on to the nitpicks!

 

Toward the beginning of the first act, a character receives a telepathic dream. The external source from the dream is confirmed by the computer. No one seems to think this is a big deal or strange... like, does this happen all the time?
Valerian has a soul hanging out in his body... but it seemingly does nothing except give him a good gut feeling where to go a couple times. Some odd jealous comments are made by the girl since it's a girl's soul in his body. It feels like such a bigger deal than it plays out in the movie. The implementation of the soul system also felt half-baked. Do souls always occupy someone? What if there's no queen/mom/priestess to help remove the soul? 
I'm going to give Bubble's "you love this girl I never met" ranting a pass because she reads Valerian's mind for a split second and you can imagine that she somehow go to know the girl that way but it did come off as a little peculiar when she was giving romantic advice.

Edited July 23, 2017 by jenius

[hachi]

OK, so I read Ambassador of the Shadows, where most of the movie's inspiration came from.

Spoiler

 

Laureline definitely had more interesting adventures than Valerian did. Good thing I had enough willpower to NOT read Ambassador of the Shadows before I saw the movie. Those scenes with Rihanna were definitely a waste. In the comic it was Laureline who did the infiltration mission not Valerian. I would have been pissed. Some parts of the story were modified for the better, but there were still some wasted scenes.

Maybe Luc was 'stretched' too thin getting this movie made? He could have done the first 2 Valerian stories and since they didn't involve aliens the budget could have been lower. I also do wonder maybe he didn't think he could make another movie so he just poured everything into this one with all the aliens and special effects. OK I'll be off to Reddit to see what the long-time fans think.

[Dynaman]

If anyone wants to see this at the theater you better go quickly.  $17M is astoundingly bad.  On the plus side the BluRay version will be out next week at this rate.