Ash, Co-Starring Iko Uwais

The planet dubbed “Ash” by the exploratory team is admittedly a bit of a fixer-upper. The atmosphere is only partially toxic. However, by the Earth’s current standards, that sounds like a pretty good deal. Unfortunately, something else got there first, which is always how things work in movies like Flying Lotus’s Ash, which opens today in theaters.

Dozens of teams were dispatched to prospective planets in hope of finding a suitable refuge from the Earth’s imminent eco-destruction. Ash was looking like a decent candidate, until something went wrong. Riya Ortiz is not sure what happened. She came to with a severe case of amnesia amid the dead bodies of most of her fellow crew, who clearly died violent, grisly deaths.

Eventually, Brion, from their orbiting overwatch comes down to investigate. Obviously, he is a little suspicious of Ortiz and she is a little suspicious of him. He insists she keep medicating, in the hopes that it might temper her possible psychotic eruptions. Nevertheless, she keeps having flashes of memory return, which suggest something not unlike John Carpenter’s The Thing.

It is absolutely bizarre that Flying Lotus (a.k.a. Steven Ellison) gave dramatically more screentime to both Aaron Paul and Elza Gonzalez (who play Ortiz and Brion) than martial arts superstar Iko Uwais, who portrays their commander, Adhi. However, at least he gets a showcase fight sequence that shows off his skills.

To be fair, Paul portrays Brion with convincing shiftiness, but Gonzalez is no Helen Ripley—not even close. Frankly, aside from Uwais, the only crew-member contributing any charisma or screen presence would be Beulah Koale as Kevin (who also happens to be a jazz trumpeter, which is a nice bit of character development).

Most genre fans will also anticipate every beat of Jonni Remmler’s screenplay, well in advance. However, the effects and the gory fight scenes are nicely executed (especially Uwais’s, of course). Arguably, the brutal action sequences help elevate Ash above other Alien-clones (like Life).

Still, the anti-humanist message of Ash is a predictable downer. Yet again, it pointedly asks whether mankind deserves to live, if we will simply despoil yet another planet. (The truth is the environment has steadily grown cleaner over the last several decades, except in massively dirty, exploitative states like China and Russia, so maybe Ash is lecturing the wrong audience.)

Regardless, Ash is mostly just okay. When you factor out Uwais’s skills, it is a whole lot like an awful lot of other films you’ve already seen. Not enough to recommend in theaters, Ash opens today (3/21).