Serious, big budget adult-aimed dramas are in pretty short supply today in Hollywood, even when films are actually coming out, so the release of Reminiscence, a sci-fi noir by the co-creator of Westworld, peaked my interest. Unfortunately it’s not one I will remember.
Reminiscence is the story of Nick, a man who helps others relive their memories in the near future where Miami is half underwater and the world is the corrupt nightmare it is in every noir ever written. One day a woman walks, or rather slinks, into his workplace, seduces him and then vanishes off the face of the earth, prompting him to drop everything and hunt her down.
Everything in Reminiscence feels like it fell out of the 1940s, and not even the real 40s but the parody version that grew out of decades of jokes about femme fatales blowing smoke at grizzled, alcoholic detectives who down whiskey by the bucket. The sets and costumes, invariably lit in a way that suggests the lighting budget went on floor space, feel like an off-brand version of Bogart’s wardrobe as sold by H&M, and whole setups and scenes feel like they exist solely because we’ve seen them in old movies. Or, more likely, parodies of old movies.
When your film begins with the femme fatale entering the tough, cynical hero’s workplace and immediately stripping off to seduce him you’re starting in parody territory, but no matter how cliched Reminiscence gets it expects you to take it seriously. Rebecca Ferguson, the femme in question, appears later singing in a nightclub in a sexy dress into one of those circular stand microphones I doubt most people under fifty have seen in real life, and the obligatory gruff voiceover about life and death and the one that got away feels straight out of Max Payne.
The film’s cast is one of the most baffling I’ve seen in a while. Hugh Jackman as a hard boiled war veteran is hard enough to buy, as his inherent charm and decency shine through any level of unkemptness, but Rebecca Ferguson as a femme fatale is the worst choice of all. While a great actress she cannot help but project the image of someone who does not like to make a show of her sexuality, so her attempts at seduction play like someone trying very hard to do something she doesn’t like. Cliff Curtis as the intimidating heavy looks downright natural in comparison.
Beyond its tedious, convoluted plot, bad direction, thin, too-familiar characters and embarrassing attempts at social commentary, Reminiscence ultimately has the same problem as every sci-fi noir from the past ten years: it’s trading in tropes that no longer have value. Blade Runner worked because the noirs it riffed on, and the world that created them, were still ones its audience were familiar with and related to. The art deco dystopias and nightclubs where femme fatales prowled and everyone slowly contracted lung cancer still meant something to people in the eighties the way they don’t today, and a world-weary purple voiceover now primes audiences to expect a parody. You can’t tell a story of the future through a past your audience never knew.
