We open with a flash back (or flash-forward). Armed, military-type personnel are falling from the sky in what looks like a post-apocalyptic urban environment. People are falling into a rooftop pool and *splash* Chris Pratt emerges.
I’ll be honest; this isn’t my usual type of film. I do like sci-fi and I love creature-feature films but I wouldn’t have sought this one out had there not been such a buzz around it and also had the trailer not been so inviting. In the trailer, Chris Pratt is clearly announced as the lead and he brings a certain weight to the film but seeing Betty Gilpin, J.K Simmons and Yvonne Strahovski alongside him, I felt it gave the film an extra sense of credibility. To give films akin to The Tomorrow War, for me, think Avatar (2009) meets Independence Day (1996) meets Starship Troopers (1997) with the recent Tenet (2020).
This could have been film 1 of 2 and a sequel could still happen but at a run time of 2hrs 20mins this could have definitely been split. I’m glad they didn’t. It didn’t labour or feel stinted. The opening segment made me wince however. One word. Football. Or if you’re not from Europe, ‘Soccer’. I’ll get to that.
It’s Christmas. Dan Forester (Chris Pratt) and his wife Emmy Forester (Betty Gilpin) live in a nice suburban area, and are hosting a Christmas party. Dan is looking for a new job, he’s trying to get out of teaching High School Biology. He has a military background and it looking to utilise it in the research area. We can see he has a great relationship with his daughter Muri (Ryan Kiera Armstrong). He get’s overlooked for a job and he’s upset. Muri is his main comfort, “Everything’s gonna be ok Dad” she says.
During this party they’re watching the Football World Cup. Now, this is where I winced. When American productions try to imitate football commentary it lacks, feels out of place and wholly ingenuine. ‘Goalie’ I haven’t heard since I was a child. Well Chris, remember this is a make-believe world. Anyway, as the Brazilian forward has a one-on-one chance with the opposing keeper, a purple flash of lightening and smoke erupts on the field, right in front of the striker. The afore mentioned military-looking people emerge. A young woman steps from the smoulder and announces to the stadium, “We are you, 30 years in the future. We are fighting a war. Our enemy is not human, and we are losing. In eleven months’ time all human beings in the future will be wiped from the face of the Earth, unless you, help us. We need you… We need you to fight beside us if we stand a chance at winning this war”. She continues, now staring right down the camera to the audience at home and us sitting, streaming, “You. Are our last hope”.
Alright, the plot is set-up. They’ve come to recruit everyone to come and fight 28 years in the future against an alien enemy. Cue world-wide riots, TV punditry and plenty of news reports. Turns out, with Dan’s previous military service, he is an ideal candidate to go and fight. He’s conscripted and is told he’s going on a rescue mission to save a group of researchers trapped in their research building due to the surrounding enemy. They can ‘jump’ to and from the future war nowhere else and to no other time. So, us smart-arses at home have already been silenced from spouting our, 'why don't you just go back to, blah, blah, blah...'.
Emmy is adamant that he shouldn’t have to go and fight, so he turns to his estranged father James (J.K. Simmons) for help. After James’ time serving in Vietnam, he’s developed skills in circumventing technology and has honed his skills with a weapon. As Dan says, “You have a master’s degree in engineering and a general disdain for the U.S. Government”. Dan chooses not to accept his help after an argument and instead try and play his part in helping fight in the future war.
During basic training Dan encounters Dorian (Edwin Hodge) who was in the first wave fighting the enemy and survived, which is quite astounding as the survival rates are incredibly low and he’s been on a few tours. Dorian has a claw around his neck which he claimed form the corpse of one of the Whitespikes, the name given to the invaders. In classic ‘unseen enemy’ style, we have been given snippets of what the creatures are like, think how long we took to see anything in Alien (1979). We’re tantalised and we have our imaginations running wild, especially considering the size of the claw around Dorian’s neck, these things must be huge.
We are treated to some slick CGI as the conscripts jump and drop into the future. Why drop? Well, they get dropped about 10ft above the ground, so they all need to prepare for the drop by getting into a mildly humorous squat position.
They are dropped, but not where they were supposed to be. It seems we’re back in that post-apocalyptic world that we saw in the intro. This is Miami, as one character says, “I’m just glad Will Smith isn’t alive to see this”. An obvious reference to his song ‘Miami’ but hey, Independence Day?
Over the communications radio Dan talks to Romeo Command (Yvonne Strahovski) a head-strong researcher for the military who is attempting to find a way to wipe the assailants off the face of the Earth. Again, we can sort of see the Whitespikes when we are shown a first-person view through some binoculars, however, they area still hidden to us, then in the reflection on the front of binoculars we see how fast these things can move in tearing some downed soldiers apart, but we can’t see them fully.
During their infiltration into the research labs, they finally come face to face with the Whitespikes and boy oh boy are they ugly and dangerous. In a wonderful slow reveal, 48mins in, we get to see them in their deadly hideousness.
Dan and 'Romeo’s' relationship is key to this film, and it is acted out unbelievably well. I felt genuine warmth and concern for each other’s characters coming from them, which made this, what could have been totally implausible film, incredibly palatable. A lot of modern sci-fi films today give you very little science behind the unbelievable thing that’s going on, or give you some quick faux science, which I think is great. When a film tries to over explain or over justify what they’re doing and why they’re doing it, we start to believe it less and less. Just let the suspension of disbelief do the rest.
Can Dan and 'Romeo' work together to find away to defeat the Whitespikes in the future, to give them past some hope? It's going to take a lot of bullets and a bit of science!
Punctuated with well judged humour and some absolutely epic fight scenes, I thought The Tomorrow War was a fantastic treat. For me it was reminiscent of Avatar - jumping into a body in an unknown universe to fight a dangerous enemy. It also has scenes that could have been lifted from World War Z (2013). Aliens invading Earth causing a mass-extinction event pulled thoughts of Independence Day again and again. With big scale fight scenes that you would see in the best of the Avengers films, excellent CGI and genuine drama with cheeky twist and turns, my attention was not lost during the 2hr 20min run. Streaming now on Amazon Prime, you’ll not be disappointed when you add this to your weekend watch-list.
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