Movie Review: 'Morgan'
By Bill Wine
KYW Newsradio 1060
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Morgan is a generic smorgasbord – a buffet of science fiction, horror, mystery, and thriller elements.
Oh, and let's not forget action flicks, which, after a promising start and to its discredit, this film devolves into in the late going.
The premise: a humorless, playing-it-close-to-the-vest risk-management consultant, Lee Weathers, played by Kate Mara, arrives at a top-secret facility, her mission to determine whether or not to terminate the "life" of an artificial being – the humanoid title character,
played by Anya Taylor-Joy – who (which) was created by a group of genetic-testing scientists five years ago as part of a funded experiment by a huge and vaguely sinister corporation in a laboratory environment where the world's most advanced artificial being represents a potential and possible result.
And why has Lee Weathers been summoned by her corporate bosses now?
Because Morgan, for no apparent reason, attacked one member of the staff, a Dr. Grieff, played by Jennifer Jason Leigh, and did severe damage to her face.
Lee's job is, if necessary, to stop the program before Morgan either does damage to anyone else on the staff or completely escapes the facility.
Morgan, you see, was created and raised by the current staff and they're very protective of her.
Morgan certainly exceeded their expectations: why, she could walk and talk after a month.
At six months, she was already self-sustaining. She's five now, but she looks 18.
But although they refer to her as "she" as in "she's special," they really do know that she's actually an "it," even though that's a rather easy fact to temporarily forget when they're interacting with "her."
And she has a number of superhuman qualities that make her, among other things, quite dangerous.
So corporate troubleshooter Weathers has dropped in on this secret, remotely located complex to observe the behavior and accomplishments of scientists Toby Jones, Michelle Yeoh, and Rose Leslie; nutritionist Boyd Holbrook; and psychologist Paul Giamatti.
The debuting director, Luke Scott, working from a script by Seth W. Owen that addresses the age-old sci-fi theme of scientists playing God perhaps best represented by Frankenstein, is the oldest son of veteran director Ridley Scott, all three of whose sons have taken to directing. Luke's background is in music videos, so perhaps it's no surprise to discover that his first feature film's chief limitations occur in the third act of this feature-length film.
Elements of the director's father's classic, Alien, do announce themselves, as does the similarly themed Ex Machina. But comparisons with those two exemplary science fiction thrillers does this one no favors.
Our problem is that we just don't connect emotionally with anybody on-screen so that our vested interest when push comes to shove – and worse – in the climax, we are merely objective observers.
If there's one scene that displays a level of tension and electricity that the rest of the film could only dream about, it's Paul Giamatti's single, crucial scene in the middle of the proceedings.
But it ends up mostly reminding us of what might have been.
So let's create 2 stars out of 4. The bioengineering thriller, Morgan, comes up short as a portrait of an artificial being because we too often catch it being artificial.
