‘Edge Of Tomorrow’ starring Tom Cruise, is a sci-fi thriller that takes place in the near future. When the film opens, we find out that an alien race known as Mimics have invaded the Earth, wiping out millions and so far, they are unbeatable.
Cruise plays Major William Cage, a slick public relations officer in the U. S. army, a post he took up after his advertising company went belly up. An alien invasion could do that.
He’s never seen a day of combat. His job is to put a ‘good spin’ on our war with these invaders from space, and get people to join the military and fight.
Because he’s done such a good job, General Brigham (Brendan Gleeson) now wants him to report from ground zero, to give people around the world a window onto the battleground. Cage, who can’t even stand the sight of blood, refuses to go, pissing off Brigham who winds up knocking him out.
When Cage wakes up, he finds himself at Heathrow Airport in London, which has been commandeered by UDF (United Defense Force) as military headquarters.
He’s immediately greeted by a Sergeant Farell (Bill Paxton) He explaining to Farell that there’s been a mistake…that’s he’s an officer…and doesn’t belong here.
Farell doesn’t believe him. In fact, he tells Cage that he knows for a fact that he’s a private and a deserter. If that’s not bad enough, Cage also discovers that he is now a member of J Squad, which is made up of six dysfunctional soldiers who are gung-ho to kick some ‘alien butt’.
Cage has no choice but to go along with the Squad’s mission which is basically a suicide one. As soon as Cage lands on the beach where the big battle is to take place, he’s killed.
End of story…Not quite. Cage finds himself inexplicably thrown into a time loop that forces him to live out the same brutal battle over and over, fighting and dying again and again.
Lucky for Cage, he runs into Special Forces warrior chick, Rita Vrataski (Emily Blunt) who knows what’s really going on and helps our reluctant soldier to develop the skills he needs to defeat the alien enemy.
‘Edge OfTomorrow’ directed by Doug Liman, is based on a Japanese novel, ‘All You Need Is Kill’ by author Hiroshi Sakurazaka. The film is exciting, funny, with killer action scenes and Cruz and Blunt have great chemistry together.
‘Edge Of Tomorrow’ written by Christopher McQuarrie (‘The Usual Suspects’), with help from, Jez and John-Henry Butterworth opens in theatres Friday June 6, 2014 and I gave it 4 bagels out of 5.
Check out the Two Jews On Film video for more of my thoughts.
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