Directed By:
Shawn Levy
Written By:
Jonathan Tropper, T.S. Nowlin, Jennifer Flackett
Starring:
Ryan Reynolds, Jennifer Garner, Walker Scobell, Mark Ruffalo
Genre:
Action, Adventure, Comedy
Rated: PG-13 for violence/action, language and suggestive references.
All media used courtesy of Netflix
In The Adam Project, Adam (Walker Scobell) is in a difficult point in his childhood. He can’t properly emote his feelings, often lashing out at his widowed mother (Jennifer Garner) and using sarcasm as a defense to avoid the troubles in his life. That is, until a time-traveling pilot (Ryan Reynolds) crash lands outside his house needing his help to save the universe. Not only is this man from the future, but he’s an older version of himself! Both of them, along with their late father (Mark Ruffalo) will have to come to terms with their past while saving the future, in this charming film that may miss the excellence of a Steven Spielberg-esque film, but is still rewarding in it’s own way.
Whenever a film centers it’s logic around time-travel, it can be very messy. Try not to be bogged down by the “how” with this film and center in around the emotions of the characters and tone. There’s something about the tone in The Adam Project that feels warm and familiar. I enjoyed the different Adams bantering with each other and they’re different motivations. Old Adam is on a mission to save his wife (Zoe Saldaña) but also feels the need to try and course correct his younger self, lending tidbits of forewarnings about the way young Adam treats his family and how to essentially correct the mistakes of old Adam before it’s too late.
The references to Star Wars and multiple other sci-fi adventure films aren’t bad, but there’s quite a bit of them. I wish there was more for some of these characters to do so that the climax feels more centered around the entire family working together. The villain doesn’t do much, along with her henchmen that all feel disposable at best. Also, if you’ve watched Deadpool or Deadpool 2 you might have already seen Ryan Reynolds performance here, as he continues to not delineate his different performances to feel fresh and unique. Now everything he touches feels like a Deadpool variant, and where you stand on that will influence how you feel about him in this.
Overall, I did have a good time watching The Adam Project, and even watched it twice so far! There’s some great concepts here that might need a little help in execution, but overall still delivered on a family adventure everyone can get into.
