 When the trailers for this movie were coming out, there were people talking about, well, we've always kind of wanted to see what a visual interpretation of this would be like. Like, man, well, not at the beginning of Call of Duty Ghosts, kind of. Obviously with guns, but, you know. Heh, Star Wars. Hey guys, this is my review for ISS. This is one of the January dumps of the year, and technically speaking, it absolutely deserves to be here, because this movie is kind of really boring. The film follows a crew of American and Russian astronauts on the ISS, two new ones and acclimating to the environment, having all nice ha-ha-ha. And then about 20 minutes in, they see that nuclear war has begun on planet Earth, and both the Russian and the Americans get secret communique about having to take control of the ISS. Now, there's two ways this movie could have gone. There is the more philosophical way that this could have gone in terms of that these guys are scientists first, and political instruments second. Being that their moral conundrum would have been, do we care more about what the purpose of the ISS is in terms of helping better humanity rather than the mundane conflict that is clearly destroying the planet below us, or do we just kind of make this a generic sort of thriller about, who should I trust? I really thought they were going to go into a moral conundrum about it. The movie starts even with a goddamn dialogue block about what the importance of the ISS is, and they say it. Throughout the beginning of the movie, talking about what each experiment means, and there's some that are just very heavy-handed, and there's a few that you feel that they are meant to be red herrings, but in the end, they are almost inconsequential because of how dull the plot is. It doesn't help either that the performances from everyone in this movie aren't really great. Ariana DeBose, who plays the lead, she's more so from theater, and not saying that theater and musical actors can acclimate to film well, but she is meant to be the main character of this movie, and she's just kind of there. It doesn't really feel that her plot elements are of more interest, or of equal interest to that of the other characters, because there are a few here that have some moments, like probably the best person in this movie is Alexi. He is the character that is going through the moral conundrum that I was hoping this movie would do, because there's other actors in this, like John Gallagher Jr., who I like, but he is almost a comical character in terms of his hysteria. And then you've also got the guy who plays Nikolai, Constan Ronan. He goes cold-blooded villain, quite quick. Now, I understand that there would be maybe one or two people on the ship that would have been the country first, everything like that, but his transition is so rapid that you don't even get to truly see how he came to that conclusion. As I was saying, the guy who plays Alexi Pulio-Lazbek, he is the best person in this movie. He's the one who goes through the moral conflict of what is the right action in this movie, because the script written by Nick Safry is probably a little bit more up his own butt than he actually thinks. The film is not as smart as it thinks it is. The characters are not as well written as they should be, and the dilemma is so utterly fucking predictable that you can basically pinpoint the movie like a map, and you will know how the movie will go. To the really corny fight scene, to the conclusion where you already know how the movie will end about 20 minutes before it actually happens, and it's supposed to be this, oh, this philosophical thought, but in reality, no, it's because Nick didn't know how to end his fucking movie, and he thought he was being smart, ending it like this. It doesn't help either, too, that the director, Gabrielle Cowper-Thwight, is a documentary director, first and foremost. Again, not to say that people of the industry can switch genres and switch styles, but it does take a bit, and there are some shots that do feel like it's out of a documentary in terms of the passive observer. Making a documentary film is having the story be told to you and putting that into a story to then be given to people. Whereas a film, you are making the story to give to the people, and I feel that this film suffers from it. It also does seem to be a trend. I still do not understand why this new Ray movie is being filmed by a documentary filmmaker. Not going into any of the very clear misdirection, misinformation that's been going on about her, like that interview being from a film about fucking honor killings. Yes, she was right to say what she said back then, but there are far more talented people, far more talented female filmmakers who should be doing this movie, but I don't think any of them want to fucking touch Star Wars right now. Either way, that tangent aside, ISS is boring, predictable, nowhere near as smart as it thinks it is, and it wasted a moral dilemma story that could have been really well done if it was executed correctly. So in the end, I'm gonna give ISS A2 out of seven. Anyways, guys, those are my thoughts about this movie. Very interesting to see what you guys would say. Please let me know in the comments below, and we'll see you guys on the next review. And if you liked the video, please leave a like. And until then, see you guys next time.