Review: The Darkest Hour

Emile Hirsch and Max Minghella are a couple of entrepreneurial Yank web designers in Russia hoping to sell their product internationally, but who get screwed over by a Eurotrash colleague (Joel Kinnaman) almost as soon as they land. As soon as the duo are about to drown their sorrows, however, things go to hell. A citywide blackout, followed by strange lights emanating from the sky. Oh, and people suddenly being zapped and evaporating. The Russians...er...aliens are coming! The Aliens are coming! Our heroes, their douchy Eurotrash rival, and a couple of pretty young tourists (Aussie Rachael Taylor, and American Olivia Thirlby) must stick together, evade the aliens, and find safe refuge. And formulate a plan of retaliation.

 

Directed by Chris Gorak (a former production designer in only his second directorial gig) from a script by Jon Spaihts (the polarising “Prometheus”- which I personally liked), this 2011 alien invasion film is neither as bad as you’ve heard, nor as good as it could’ve been. It ain’t “War of the Worlds” (nor the post-apocalyptic “The World, the Flesh and the Devil” for that matter), and the FX are so bad you’d swear the film was a ‘work print’ released by mistake. It was filmed and set in Russia, so one assumes money wasn’t exactly free-flowing, but I’m really surprised it was released, they’re that phony. No wonder the trailer was so bare-bones, they didn’t want you to know how cheap it looks. Speaking of cheapo Russian locales, the film tries for an eerily empty “28 Days Later” vibe, but it just looks like typical ugly Russia to me (Where the sun is apparently just another shade of grey. Like Melbourne, I guess).

 

Still, the basic story, clichéd or not, is pretty durable, and I found there was a surprise death or two as well. I also like the idea of aliens messing around with our electricity, it seems pretty plausible, so far as alien invasions go (I still think aliens just need to knock out our electricity and sit back and wait for us to kill each other). Meanwhile, unlike “Battle: Los Angeles” and “Cloverfield”, you can actually follow the action. Hooray for the steady camerawork of Scott Kevan (who previously wobbled his way through “The Losers”). It’s pretty dark, but it was originally shown in 3D and probably looked even worse there. In fact, I bet the 3D was completely useless here. It’s interesting that one of the protagonists in the film is actually a bit of a villain, it’s just that there’s much bigger villains here. It’s also kinda fun to see a film like this set in Russia where several decades ago, the aliens would be an allegorical reference to the threat of Communism. I could’ve done without the obvious “28 Days Later” rip-off with the old dude and the girl, though.

 

The cast doesn’t set the world alight (Emile Hirsch is terrible here, Aussie Rachael Taylor can’t act, and poor, likeable Max Minghella is typecast), but Olivia Thirlby is a definite standout. Hirsch is less punchable than he was in “Into the Wild”, however. The film’s strongest asset is a good, throbbing score by Tyler Bates (The tolerable remakes of “The Day the Earth Stood Still” and “Halloween”).

 

Geez, it’s not that bad guys, and it contains elements that could’ve been worked into a decent film, if the budget and cast were jacked up a bit. Spaihts’ script is based on a story by Spaihts, M.T. Ahern and Leslie Bohem (Van Damme’s “Nowhere to Run”, “A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child”, the underrated “Daylight”). Worth a look if you set your sights real low.

 

Rating: C+