When you see a Tom Cruise a sci-fi thriller, you think back to his performances in Minority Report or Oblivion, both good movies, the thing is in Edge of Tomorrow, Cruise delivered crisper, stronger performances than the aforementioned efforts, while acting in a film with a superior plot line. Once you can get past the Groundhog Day movie plot of reawakening the next day reliving your previous 24 hours all over again, Edge of Tomorrow has a more gruesome revival process to restart each day, the death of it’s star. Gruesome but necessary in this ingenious movie.
Cruise stars as a Major William Cage, a star recruiter in the world army set out to eliminate the Earth from an invading alien enemy. The world is at the edge of a global takeover from this alien foe, which has already conquered most of Europe. At first, Cruise’s only responsibility is to recruit millions of new recruits for the global effort to fight this invading force. He is a great PR rep but, is in no way a solider, so when he is ordered on the front lines, he knows it is his own death-sentence, and this is where his “infinitely looped” day begins.
In this recurring time period, on the eve of battle, Cruise is finds himself in a confusing and incredible chain of reoccurring days immediate death, as a solider on the front lines. Each time on the battlefield, he suffers some a new way to die from the onslaught of alien forces. After a battlefield encounter with Rita Vrataski (Emily Blunt) where she pleas with him to find her after his next death reboot, Cruise strategize on how he can find Rita Vrataski aka the “Angel of Verdun.” Blunt plays a war harden elite solider that has had the same time loop continuum that Cruise is now experiencing in the film. Edge of Tomorrow does a great job at explaining the time paradox early on, and shows there is a real cause-effect as to what the duo does and how it will effect the outcome of their ultimate victory.
How does this time anomaly actually work? Well that’s the ingenious part of this movie. They are fighting an opponent that can actually view the future, Blunt and Cruise are the rare two humans that have absorbed the time-loop abilities by it, literally, spilling on them from the blood of one of the higher level alien foes called an “Alpha.” The endgame is to destroy the “Omega” alien, the brains of the invading alien horde using the ability to maneuver through the same day to find the “Omega.” Our heroes have numerous challenges to save the world. Not that the obvious threat of the alien beach invasion they have the dubious challenge of convincing their commanding officer, General Brigham (Brendan Gleeson), that they are not totally insane by claiming Cruise has seen the future and has come back to win the war.
The end product is that Tom Cruise pulled off his best sci-fi role ever. Watching director director Doug Liman (The Bourne Identity, Mr. & Mrs. Smith) have Emily Blunt welding her 7 foot sword in her battle suit, the “Angel of Verdun,” look like a CGI Gundum suit circa 1980’s Japanese anime series Mobile Suit Gundam. The story line moved in a unique multi-future scenario, and this three-pronged approach in plot twists made me feel like I saw 3 movies in one. Even the romantic subplot, which was based on traits of trust, respect and admiration, it seemed like a more realistically approach at a love connect. I will say that after walking out of the theater, I quickly surmised that, Edge of Tomorrow can officially be called an early Summer hit!