After a crash landing, a father and son explore a planet that was evacuated by humans 1,000 years earlier.
“This is not training,” says Will Smith to his son in this trailer for After Earth, the new movie from that burnt-out husk of a director M. Night Shyamalan, but it’s pretty clear that what we’re watching is, indeed, training. It’s Will training his son Jaden to become as big a star was he is, and it’s actually quite impressive that amount of star power that Will Smith still possesses. Unfortunately, this movie looks pretty half-baked, as has been the case with so many Shyamalan films in recent years. First, let’s talk about the plot – I like the hook of a father and son going back to earth after humanity has left it behind for 1000 years, but the way they seem to be playing things is full of that Shyamalan nonsense. It’s like M. Night took all the…I hesitate to call them villains…antagonistic aspects of the world around us and packed them into this film. Nature itself is out to get Jaden Smith. And is it just me, or is the trailer trying to pretend that Will Smith survives that impact at the beginning? Because he’s pretty obviously dead, isn’t he? Anyway, I feel like I’m starting to ramble. My final analysis is that I will wait for it to come out on video.
After Earth comes out June 7, 2013.