Apparently the primary sci-fi movie from the Czech Republic in 40 years, this so-called Czech Blade Runner is definitely equally indebted to Minority Report (whose home futurism continues to be quietly influential). Like Tom Cruise’s character in Steven Spielberg’s movie, detective Em Trochinowska (Andrea Mohylová) is a cop susceptible to brooding over clips of an absent cherished one. Her live performance pianist husband was murdered by members of the Rivers of Life terrorist group, who’re outraged by the nature-flouting “restoration” know-how that permits any lately snuffed individual to be resurrected.
Unhealthy information for many who don’t filter out their inboxes often: the know-how solely works if in case you have bothered to add your recollections throughout the final 48 hours. The place Minority Report riffed on the notion of pre-crime, this can be a post-crime insurance coverage in a Mitteleuropean dystopia awash in violence. Trochinowska is named to research a double “absolute homicide” of a pair who’ve been oddly remiss about backing up: restoration scientist David Kurlstat (Matěj Hádek) and his spouse. Resident tech demigod Rohan (Karel Dobrý), who’s head of the institute that invented all of it and aware of an upcoming privatisation, is unhelpful. So a robust whiff of corruption is emanating from these glittering brutalist towers.
Robert Hloz’s directorial debut is definitely handsome for a $2m (£1.6m) movie, nailing the hyper-metropolis vistas and ubiquitous glassy wearables anticipated of the near-future dystopian idiom. However nonetheless slick-looking the interface, beneath the hood it’s bolted collectively from so many borrowed elements – together with Blade Runner’s preoccupation with unreliable reminiscence – that it forgets to find its personal philosophical kernel. Hloz overcompensates as a substitute with a needlessly byzantine plot – through which a Europol agent (Václav Neužil) encroaches on Trochinowska’s sleuthing – and a vehement, airless efficiency fashion throughout the board. Mohylová, supposedly the emotional linchpin, comes throughout as robotic – and never in an enigmatic Rick Deckard approach. A valiant stab nonetheless at equalling Hollywood futurescapes, Restore Level ought to stave off cyber-noir cravings for a few hours. It’s a reliable copy however unmistakably artificial.
