Part disaster movie, part post apocalyptic road-trip, part alien invasion story, THE 5TH WAVE is a mashup of many successful films, and decidedly less than the sum of its parts.
Talented Chloe Grace Moretz stars as Cassie, a normal high school-er who finds her everyday life upturned and uprooted when aliens in "Independence Day" and "V" style massive ships appear above the Earth and begin kicking our asses in five waves.
To be honest, the film really didn't stick with me in a way that I can recite which waves were which, but I know them whomp us with a pulse bomb to knock out all our power and communication, then they cause a massive earthquake that generates massive tsunamis that devastate coastal cities, just like in "The Day After Tomorrow", blah blah blah.
Cassie ends up separated from her younger brother, well played by Zackary Arthur and is driven to get back to him at all costs.
Luckily for Cassie, she meets two ripped young dudes that both want to help her, a quarterback and a farmer (hey wait, a young heroine torn between two young dudes, where have we heard that...Katniss? "The Hunger Games" you say???)
Liev Scheriber must have needed rent money, as he took this one note part, rolling into a survivor camp as Colonel Vosch, recruiting the surviving kids as the last hope against the aliens.
The next few plot points strain credibility, creaking slowly toward a decent finale.
By the time the big plot twist hit, I could only attribute it to screenwriter Akiva Goldsman (I Am Legend, A Beautiful Mind) who's slumming here trying to sow the young adult novel into something more challenging for the masses.
Poor Chloe. She's a terrific actress that does what she can with the material, the opening act of a proposed trilogy based on the books.
With a $38 million budget and a total box office draw of $34 million, I think ticket buyers have defeated the aliens and saved us from parts 2 and 3.
Count your blessings, humans.
The 5th Wave gets a C.
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