Terminal (2018)

Every now and then a film comes along which looks like it's going to be an exciting game changer... and then just ends up feeling stylishly tired. Writer/director Vaughn Stein's Terminal (not to be confused with the more famous Tom Hanks movie which also did not live up to the hype) is one of those films. It has an it-cast and a flashy look but can't muster the enthusiasm necessary to carry it through. It even has the kind of cool-twist-dark-plot vibe to its story which should have delivered a more satisfying punch. But it all just sort of falls flat.

It was hard to maintain the energy to carry it through. It's characters were just not there enough to make us care and despite Stein's heavily stylized approach, he never tied his swanky visuals to the narrative in a way that compels us through the story.

While the charismatic Margot Robbie's femme fetal character has all the hallmarks of the sort of protagonist we should love to follow, the film's reliance of sleight of hand keeps all characters' backstories at more than arm's length making it hard to connect with any of them. Once we finally get to what should have been a devastating twist it is just hard to care.

Stein's work here reminds me of Alex Proyas and how often his glamorously lovely films didn't have the story to match the style. That is what is terminal for this film.

Terminal
Starring: Margot Robbie, Simon Pegg, Dexter Fletcher, Max Irons, Mike Meyers
Writer/Director: Vaughn Stein