Ash

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Ash
Starring Eiza Gonzalez, Aaron Paul, Iko Uwais, Beulah Koale
Directed by Flying Lotus

Sci-fi alien movies are fascinating, and I've always had a soft spot for them. Throw in wild visuals and an insane final act, and you get "Ash" - a flawed movie but saved thanks to the visuals and the utterly insane ending that makes me wish this was a short film rather than a full-length feature.

Landing on a different planet, Riya (Eiza Gonzalez) awakens with no memory of who she is or what happened, but she gets flashes of her fellow crew members being murdered. Thinking she's alone, she discovers Brion (Aaron Paul), who heard a distress call and came to investigate. She worries that she might've killed her crewmates but doesn't know why, and is unsure if she can trust Brion either - and things only get worse when they keep hearing of an unidentified life-form detected on the ship.

"Ash" is an interesting film because for the majority of it, I was detached from it. The movie spends most of its time with Eiza Gonzalez and Aaron Paul wandering around the ship wondering what happened, with brief flashbacks of snippets of events. It would make for an intriguing mystery if it wasn't already obvious about the outcome, and I wasn't too keen on the film for a long time.

However, the final act ramps up to one thousand percent, especially from the slow burn of the center of the movie that just seemed to spin its wheels before hitting maximum velocity. The ending is intense, action packed, horrific, and bombastic in all the right ways, saving this from becoming one of the worst films of the year.

Another saving grace is the visuals, which musician/director/star Flying Lotus excelled at. This could've been a music video with the outrageous visuals that really stick in your mind, setting it apart from other films and giving a "Dead Space" feel. It's pretty lackluster to say a third act and visuals save an entire movie - and by no means do I think it's good - but it saves it from becoming one of the worst.

The Score: D+

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