How It Ends (2018)

What starts off feeling like a low-budget drama, How It Ends evolves into a stylistic sci-fi film with some really nice special effects that show off the feature-length’s estimated $20M budget. But the movie is not without its flaws. Theo James seems almost lifeless as “Will” in this post-apocalyptic adventure – did he ever establish a character before getting on camera? It doesn’t feel like it. James lumbers through scenes, lacks depth, and is just never believable as a man on a mission to save his pregnant fiancé from impending doom. Forest Whitaker is Forest Whitaker as the goateed “Tom” who sets on a journey with Will, his soon-to-be son-in-law, to find his daughter Samantha. Whitaker rescues several of the scenes from being completely devoid of expression, but there is only so much you can do when the dialogue is itself so banal. How It Ends plays like a short film that was extended to feature length. There were scenes that simply could have been cut, or at least shortened to keep the pace quicker. With the right editing, the one-hour, fifty three-minute film would have been more effective at ninety minutes. But maybe Netflix steers for lengthier content — the longer the program the longer viewers are streaming from the service — and that must be good for stockholders. Entire Review: https://goo.gl/4rMqpU