Chong qi di qiu

This movie wasn't too bad, and it was kind of a cool premise for the movie and it was even funny at times. The CGI and post apocalyptical scenery was nice to look at. However, the movie had about 25 minutes of extended Drama scenes that cut have been shortened from 25 minutes of drama to like 2 minutes. So for example if a key character dies, there is no need to spend the next 5 minutes sobbing and remembering the character. My guess is they added in these scenes to take the movie up to a respectable length. So what I recommend is skipping ahead when you come to these obvious dramatic moments. That is what I did and the movie was much much better that way.

There are certain things one expects in Chinese films. Some heavy handed propaganda and some terrible voice actors. This movie has an interesting premise, and could have been done much better. Specially engineered plants have suddenly become sentient, and have taken over the earth, and are feeding on all human and animal life to sustain them. The sets are done well, clearly with CGI, and the plants themselves are done very well, with plant and snake like features, and there is a lot of CGI in this movie. Teams of soldiers are to set out at specific points on the globe, to inject a substance into the roots of the plants to kill them off, and all the many sites must do that at the same time. And we follow one team. But first we meet a man and his daughter. His wife worked developing the plants, and died when they attacked. And he wants to protect his daughter at all costs. The young daughter has the worst possible voice actor and very limited vocabulary and her voice will grate at a person very quickly. A cross between whining and annoying. A team meets up with the father and daughter and slowly, members of the team are killed by the plants. Things start to get very melodramatic, in an excessive manner, which is part of the propaganda with films like this. But the idea is very interesting, as long as one does not ask too many questions. There is a scene with the team and father and daughter in a bus that tells a person those busses can really take a licking.

I'll mention the positive first:

• better than B level acting (but not better than A level)
• very good plotline (except for CCP typical 1 person sacrifices self for everyone alive)

Now some of the negatives:

• terrible script/lines
• terrible camera work
• even worse CGI.

Now, regarding my subject/head line: The idea of plants attacking humans (including the design of the plants' cannibalistic "heads") comes from the book/movie The Day Of The Triffids".

That old movie wasn't too bad.

This movie is slightly better than that black & white one.

But the book is better than both.

So the current "Featured Review" is wrong.

Mind you, they probably didn't know about that old book/movie.

Well, what a movie.

Not exactly rife with deep philosophical under tones but if you check your brain in at the door and don't aim too high, you should not be overly disappointed.

The story itself is pretty straight forward and is not what I would call taxing. Plants, mad scientists buggering with things they shouldn't be, end of the world, yada, yada, yada.

The staging of the story was, well, nothing flash. The CQI and the set pieces were at best acceptable and at worse ordinary sometimes boarding on the laughable. For example, it was more than noticeable that as the characters were seen traversing the landscape between the high-rise buildings and the cars on the street in some scenes, the definition of the wider horizon of the landscape was decidedly flat in nature indicating an obvious green screen effect. It certainly screamed low budget.

The other part of the staging of the story, the actors, is a different kettle of fish. Some of the acting was fine, some of the acting was more than a little melodramatic and some was just horrible. Case in point on this, the gentleman who played the rotund science tech "21" (and the comedy foil) simply put couldn't act. This criticism maybe harsh though as I watched the Chinese language version with subtitles (I cannot watch dubbed movies) and a lot of his lines obviously lost a lot in translation.

Finally, the child.

This child should win the Oscar for being the single most unwarranted and annoying child character in any movie since Dakota Fanning played Rachel Ferrier in Steven Spielberg's 2005 War of the Worlds. Certainly, as the film progresses and the child becomes progressive more annoying you hope that the plants do the viewers a favor and eat her and by the end of the movie, you are left wondering if the father saved the right person....

As the movie goes, quite the mixed bag but I have seen worse so maybe 6 out of 10.

The storyline in "Restart the Earth" is simplistic, so very, very simplistic. The movie's narrative requires absolutely no involvement from the audience. This is a movie where you just lean back, grab your drink and snacks and watch the predictable and generic movie unfold, whilst the CGI is ensuring that you find some enjoyment in the movie.

It just makes zero sense why a plant would know when people are about to do something that would spell the doom of the plant, and thus be able to track down the humans and attempt to thwart their plans. Lazy writing, sure, but makes for mindless entertainment.

I have to say that the writing in "Restart the Earth" had some of the most cringeworthy and downright disturbing dialogue I have ever stumbled upon. There was a scene where a soldier sits with a little girl, and the soldier says "If your dad was dead, you could be my daughter", and the girl's father is standing right behind the girl. That dialogue was so toe-curling that it was hard to witness.

I wasn't familiar with the cast ensemble in "Restart the Earth", but they definitely had some nice enough talents on the cast list, each actor and actress did a good job with her given role and character in terms of bringing the character and the storyline, however weak it might be, to life on the screen.

Sure, I get why the movie maker would opt to put in a growling sound when you see the plant's long tendrils skulking about, searching for humans. It does add a layer of thrill and excitement to the scene. But come on, seriously? A growling plant? Since when did plants grow vocal chords? It is just downright idiotic and sort of turns what would otherwise be an exciting scene into something laughable.

Visually, then I will say that "Restart the Earth" was good. The CGI rendered plants did, for the most parts of the movie, look realistic and were well-rendered and animated, bringing the plants and their stalks to life in a believeable manner on the screen, if you can abhor from the growling sounds. However, some of the scenes where the characters are moving through the overgrown city just looks downright horrible, you can clearly see that it is green screen, and it is difficult to unsee once you notice it.

A movie such as "Restart the Earth", which clearly is a special effects dependent movie, should strive to have the best of special effects and CGI effects to be properly functional and effective.

Watchable for what it was, "Restart the Earth" is a somewhat hollow movie experience held afloat by the CGI effects. My rating of director Zhenzhao Lin's 2021 movie lands on a five out of ten stars.