Ember burns out

Is it that hard to make a quality kids movie? One that excites children’s imaginations and genuinely thrills them and their parents?

It seems that for every great piece of family entertainment there are 10 designed with the sole purpose of making money, and pander to their young audience by treating them like tasteless little idiots who will be entertained just by farts and bright colors.

City of Ember is neither great nor garbage. It starts off strong with an intriguing premise, imaginative set-design and a talented cast, but about halfway through something upsetting happens. It all goes to shit. What a waste.

The film is the latest installment in an annoying Hollywood trend of buying the rights to an insignificant teen-lit fantasy book series and dumping it onto the screen with the hope of making Narnia-like dollars. But time and time again their plans fail. Even the best adaptations, such as The Golden Compass, never seem to find the financial success the studios were hoping for.

The City of Ember is an underground civilization that was created to save the human race from a dangerous aboveground world. Think of it like a giant bunker with a population that dresses like chorus members of Oliver!

That description not doing anything for you? OK, well then, imagine the sealed-off Mars city in Total Recall sans mutants. (“Give these people air!”)

The city was created by the “builders” to last, with the aid of a giant generator, for 200 years, enough time for the outside world to … well, you know, I’m still not sure what happened.

Directions for how to leave the underground city were placed in a time locked metal box to be passed down from mayor to mayor. Yes, the box gets lost, and yes, the city eventually forgets that there is anything outside their floodlight-illuminated cave.

Two hundred years comes and goes, and the city starts to fall apart and blackouts set into darkness. Like all other stories meant for teens, it is the youngin’s, Lina Mayfleet and Doon Harrow to be exact, that have to save the day.

Lina (Saoirse Ronan, who you will remember as the young girl in Atonement) eventually discovers the forgotten metal box and with the help of Doon (Harry Treadaway) they try to save life as they know it by becoming computer generated and riding off waterfalls in a boat. They also climb up and down ladders and complain about not having enough canned food. Sound exciting? No? Good.

Full disclosure: I showed up about one minute late to the screening of City of Ember, so I missed a small bit of the opening narration. It happens.

But, usually, it’s pretty easy to catch up with the plot of a movie. Not this time. For half the film I actually thought the city might be contained inside the metal box. Either I’m very stupid, or the filmmakers have relied too much on having an audience that knows the source material inside and out. I hope it’s the latter.

The film feels like a waiting-room version of the book with many pages that have been ripped out by bored children. You get the idea and the main plot, but certain pieces of information seem inexplicably ignored or passed over.

For instance, the city occasionally is visited by giant dog-sized insects and mutant vermin. No real explanation is given for these monsters. Personally, if a moth the size of an eagle dropped out of the sky, I wouldn’t accept it as easily as they do in City of Embers. I would demand an answer. From who, I don’t quite know, but I’d demand it nonetheless.

You may have noticed I haven’t mentioned Bill Murray by this point, who plays the corrupt mayor. That’s because, unlike what the advertisements for the film want you to think, he is mostly inconsequential to the plot. He will pop up every 20 minutes or so, say a few Murray-esque one-liners and then retreat into the background while the teen leads run around in circles.

The overall problem with the film is that the audience is always a few steps ahead of the characters. We know right away that there is a livable outside world, and we have to wait for everyone in the movie to catch up. The length of the film is spent showing us things we completely expect and puzzles we already know the answer to.

The movie tells us what will happen, follows it through 100 percent and ends. What’s the point?

It’s a shame that Gil Kenan, the film’s director, went from creating one of the better kids’ movies of recent years (Monster House) to this. Let’s hope he gets his groove back soon.

Once the credits rolled I felt depressed for the families that will waste their time sitting through yet another mediocre family film because they have no other options. It’s time to demand more.

City of EmberNow playing in multiple locations** (out of five)