Warning: Contains some spoilers

The Creator is the latest sci-fi epic from Rogue One director Gareth Edwards. The film was easily one of the most anticipated movies of the fall, and it is fair to say that it has lived up to those expectations. It has received fairly positive reviews and a solid $34 million box office opening weekend against a projected $19 million. In a barren movie landscape filled with remakes and sequels, The Creator provides a breath of fresh air with an original, breathtaking film. The film headlines stunning cinematography and masterful sound design, with a solid emotional core and dialogue. The main drawback of this film is the plot can be slow or boring at times. The main characters include Joshua Taylor (John David Washington), Maya Fey-Taylor (Gemma Chan), Harun (Ken Watanabe), and Alphie (Madeleine Yuna Voyles).

The film starts in 2055, when a bombing by American A.I. starts a war between America and its Western allies and New Asia, a newly-founded country in Southeast Asia. A decade later, Taylor, a U.S. sergeant, is placed in New Asia as an undercover agent, and married to Maya. Their home is attacked by U.S. forces, and Maya finds out that Taylor is an undercover agent only in New Asia to track down and eliminate the weapon architect Nirmata. A pregnant Maya flees from Taylor and is seemingly killed by a U.S. missile strike. Five years later, Taylor is approached by the U.S. military to join a search and destroy mission on Nirmata’s new weapon, “Alpha O”. During said mission, Taylor gets separated and finds out that the weapon has taken the form of a simulant human child. Taylor goes against his orders to kill it and decides that he can use it to find his wife. He nicknames it “Alphie” and they learn multiple secrets involving his wife and the bombing that started it all. The ending of the film involves Taylor having to make a hard decision about Maya, and Alphie returning to her home in New Asia.

The film echoes strong inspiration from past works like Avatar and the Star Wars franchise. The strongest part of this movie is the incredible production design. The script and acting are all solid, but the plot could be a bit bland at times. It had an impressive $80 million budget and it shows, with some of the best CGI seen in movie history, and the editing feels smooth and seamless. The most impressive thing about the film over-achieving its predicted box office sales is the fact that it is a new and original work, not some remake of a movie that came out 30 years ago, or a part of some huge franchise. The emotional moments between Taylor and Alphie and Taylor and Maya are phenomenal. The viewer gets the sense that Taylor treats Alphie like his own child because he never got to have his own and the visible look of confusion and betrayal that Taylor has when he finds out that Maya is Nirmata is unmatched.

The overall casting and acting are solid, and there really is no standout “bad performance” in the film. John David Washington delivers one of the better performances of the year and child actor Madeleine Yuna Voyles shines in her film debut. A handful of the fight scenes in the movie are shot spectacularly. The first fight scene is maybe the film’s strongest moment of Star Wars inspiration. A later fight scene is shot almost like a scene from the Halloween franchise. Hans Zimmers’ soundtrack also stands out as a bright spot for the film. The soundtrack accentuates the film’s saddest and most intense moments perfectly, and serves not as a distraction, but as a complementary device.

In conclusion, The Creator is one of the best original films to come out this year, and the movie audience can only hope to get more films like it in the future. Gareth Edwards provides one of the most creative and inspired films of the year and some of the best performances in a while are given.