In their post Marvel careers, the brothers Anthony and Joe Russo (“Avengers: Endgame,” “Captain America: The Winter Soldier”) have had an uneven career to say the least. While their producing work has been largely stellar, bringing their names to projects like the “Extraction” series, “The Legend of Ochi,” and “Everything Everywhere All at Once,” their directorial efforts have been less than stellar. After the crime-drama misfire of “Cherry” and the film named after its own color palette “The Grey Man,” the brothers have returned to more family friendly science-fiction adventure fare with “The Electric State.”
Based on the illustrated novel by Simon Stålenhag, the film takes place in an alternate version of the 1990s after a war between humanity and the robotic animatronic machines built to serve them, led by an animatronic version of Mr. Peanut, voiced by Woody Harrelson (“The Hunger Games,” “True Detective”). After the robot's defeat by human manned drones created by tech mogul Ethan Skate, played by Stanley Tucci (“The Devil Wears Prada,” “Conclave”), they were banished to the exclusion zone, a chunk of the Midwest desert, and humanity began to use the drone technology to live their lives almost entirely in a virtual reality, piloting robotic drones to do their menial tasks. Years after the war, young orphan Michelle Greene, played by Millie Bobby Brown (“Enola Holmes,” “Stranger Things”), is visited by a small robot who claims to be her deceased brother. She then teams up with scavenging drifter Keats, played by Chris Pratt (“Parks & Recreation,” “Guardians of the Galaxy”), and his robotic friend Herman, voiced by Anthony Mackie (“Captain America: Brave New World,” “Twisted Metal”), to venture through the exclusion zone to find scientist Clark Amherst, played by Ke Huy Quan (“Everything Everywhere All at Once,” “Loki”), to locate her brother.
Admittedly, it sounds like there’s far more going on than there is, and while the film does tackle a lot of ground, it does so in a fairly neat package. At just a little over two hours, things move along at a brisk pace, proving to be a nice showcase for the elaborate and cluttered sets and robot designs. The visual effects are good, without becoming exceptional, riding a line between style and realism. Cinematographer Stephen F. Windon (“Fast Five,” “Sonic the Hedgehog (2020)”) has plenty of experience shooting visual effects heavy films, and he keeps the action clear and easily identifiable. It’s not a colorful or “pretty” film, but it certainly isn’t devoid of life or color and there’s an active effort to make things look nicer.
Unfortunately, that’s where the net positives end. What this film is at its core is a complete rehash of virtually every science-fiction family adventure film to come out post “Star Wars.” Pratt’s character dresses and acts like Han Solo, complete with a non-human sidekick. Much of the musical score from Alan Silvestri (“Back to the Future,” “Who Framed Roger Rabbit”) doesn’t just sound ripped from films like “Super 8” or “E.T.”, it sounds like those films were accidentally left on while the musical score was being recorded. Each story beat and moment feels torn from other better films in this genre: “The Iron Giant,” “E.T.” “Super 8,” “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” “A.I. Artificial Intelligence,” “Jurassic Park,” hell even “Ready Player One” feel like they’ve been stripped for parts by the film’s zombie-like robot scavengers and reassembled into the derivative hodgepodge that is this film.
Pratt and Brown are turning in what could charitably be called passible work here, and neither are any semblance of interesting. Pratt is practically sleepwalking through this kind of grimy loner role that he established he could pull off well in “Guardians,” only this time he’s accompanied by a horrendous mustache and cheap costume. Brown is delivering the same kind of precocious mediocre child-actor performance that reminds one of the likes of Spencer Breslin, with some lines even delivered as if she’s reading them for the first time. Tucci isn’t much better, working with the same copy-cat “evil CEO” material that’s been a subject of these kinds of films since the early 2000s. Giancarlo Esposito (“Breaking Bad,” “Do the Right Thing”) is here as a robot bounty hunter Marshall Bradbury, but by the time it ends you’ll be hard pressed to remember he was there. The same goes for Jenny Slate (“Gifted,” “Marcel the Shell with Shoes On”) and Brian Cox (“Deadwood,” “Succession”) who have borderline vocal cameos as Penny Pal, a mail robot, and Popfly, a baseball robot respectively.
The script, from screenwriting duo Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely (“The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe,” “Captain America: The Winter Soldier”), feels like a complete mashup of other, better films in this genre. It’s not that it attempts to harken back to those other films through moments of nostalgia, it's that they have moments and stretches of the plot simply lifted from those other films. When Michelle first meets the robot form of her brother, the scene feels like an almost shot for shot recreation of Elliot finding E.T. in his backyard. It could be seen as a fun throwback to more nostalgic family fare, but the film never does anything with these elements. It feels like a script made of puzzle pieces from better films simply because the writers couldn’t be bothered to come up with anything better. It would be disheartening, to see a concept wasted like this, even if it was an original film, but it's even more upsetting given the material this film was based on.
Stålenhag’s original book is heavy on the visuals and atmosphere, and light on story. It's the sort of book where things are implied but never confirmed. Giant battle drones pepper the landscapes, although no specific war or battle is ever mentioned. It’s a bleak tale but almost disarmingly so, one that feels human and engaging, never cold, without losing that bleakness. Some of those visuals from the book are seen built out in hyper-realistic CGI sets here, but the larger plot is completely different. Rather, the Russos seem almost uncomfortable with this kind of material, choosing instead to adapt this tale of humanity and technology with all the subtlety and emotional intelligence of a 12-year-old middle school boy on the playground. Who needs a moment of compassion between robots and humanity to exist on its own when we can keep cutting back and forth between a giant destructive battle outside.
As the film’s final emotional monologue is being given by Brown, there’s a piece of music playing beneath her speech. It isn’t a needle drop though, and as the notes well to an emotional climax, it becomes clear what the song is. In their big final emotional monologue of their film about humanity needing to reconnect after technology has split them apart, they’ve chosen to use an instrumental version of “Wonderwall.” That would already be a resoundingly obvious and mind-numbing choice, but then as the credits roll, the song “Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, Pt. 1” begins to play. This song, which contains the lyrics “Those evil-natured robots (I'll get you, Yoshimi)/They're programmed to destroy us,” feels remarkably out of place coming just after an ending which feels like a win and a humanizing victory for the downtrodden robot population. These decisions don’t come from directors who have made a film like this for emotional or creative reasons. These are decisions made by people who just want a cool song to end their cool movie, which is badass and cool, with nothing to back it up. All style, zero substance. Why is the leader of the robotic revolution Mr. Peanut, a character who wasn’t even in the original book? Well, because it's a fun childhood thing. And I’m sure Planters paid a decent bit as well.
“The Electric State” feels like a robotic concoction. Like its CGI metal characters, it's a shambling mess that looks nice and has a handful of good performances but is merely stitched together from the parts of other, better films on almost every level. From the music to the characters to the story beats, it's as if it's trying to remind you of better films not in a nostalgic way, but because otherwise the film itself wouldn’t have anything to bring to the table. What’s here honestly isn’t the worst thing in the world; it’s routine and mediocre at best. But what it represents is a far worse thing. 1.5/5
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