Edge of Tomorrow

On a whim, I saw All You Need is Kill adaptation Edge of Tomorrow this weekend with a friend. I know it's an unpopular opinion, but I like Tom Cruise movies. There's a reason the guy is a movie star. Plus, Emily Blunt runs around in a mech suit carrying a giant sword killing aliens for a good chunk of the movie, and the reviews for the movie were surprisingly positive.

Turns out those reviews were right. The movie is great. It's tightly paced, well acted, and the story is simple and straightforward in spite of the time travel conceit. Tom Cruise plays Bill Cage, an officer who does PR for the military in an attempt to avoid combat. When he refuses an order to take a film crew and document the first wave of an invasion on an alien controlled beach, he's charged with desertion, stripped of his rank, and forced into combat. 

During the battle, Cruise manages to survive long enough to kill one of the aliens and get covered in its blood before dying. He then wakes up the day before, and has to relive the day again. It turns out, the aliens that have been handily winning every battle that they've fought against the humans because they possess the ability to reset time every time they lose. They then go into the battle knowing what will happen and adjust their strategy accordingly. 

The only exception was the Battle of Verdun in which Emily Blunt's character Rita Vrataski also hijacked the alien time travel power before losing it. Cage eventually tracks down Vrataski, and with her help starts to devise a plan to win the war. This introduces one of the movie's more surprising elements: its sense of humor. Once the two characters meet, we get a pretty great training montage in which, every time Cruise's character gets hurt, Blunt shoots him to reset so they can start over. 

The time loop mechanic is integral to the story. It's the source of the movie's more humorous moments, but it's also sets up the sense of fatigue that soldiers feel in war. Cruise has great chemistry with Blunt in their scenes together, and it makes the turn when he realizes just how tired he is of seeing her die over and over again all the more effective. He really is great in the movie. 

The action, story, and characters in this movie are all very good. It could be my non-existent expectations made the movie just a surprise, but it's more likely that the film really is legitimately great. Some people might find the ending a little too pat, but it works given the rest of the story and gives another great little character moment with Cruise and Blunt before cutting to the credits. Edge of Tomorrow is a fantastic sci-fi war tale. I definitely recommend it.