Film Review: Infini (2015)

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SYNOPSIS:

An elite ‘search and rescue’ team transport onto an off-world mining-facility to rescue Whit Carmichael, the lone survivor of a biological outbreak.

REVIEW:

“Infini” begins by telling the audience about the method by which people are transmitted across vast reaches of space. The text warns of possible errors in transmission as well as the possible mental effects such instant travel can cause. It takes time to make these issues very, very clear.

Then “Infini” promptly ignores the set up as it ultimately has nothing to do with the story, plot, events, or even minor motivations. Unless you count our hero’s promise to his pregnant wife that he will be back for dinner on his first day. Even that has little to do with the opening text information.

We are dropped into a security station that is seeing a rash of insanity wiping out the most distant outpost known. Apparently, some of the insane people transmit inside the security station. As no one knows if it is psychosis from the travel or some infectious source, the entire base is locked down and filled with toxic chemicals to halt any likely spread.

But a couple of people (our hero being one of them, of course) use an unethical and illegal method to “jump” to another location, which happens to be the distant outpost which caused the lethal lockdown to begin with.

The film moves on to an elite team that is tasked with going to that remote outpost to rescue our hero, who has managed to outlive EVERYONE in the affected facility, as well as needing to stop a potentially Earth-ending payload from being transmitted from that outpost.

Basically, all of the movie takes place in just a few minutes of Earth Time, but the transmission technique causes time dilation so a minute or two on Earth equals hours and hours at the receiving end.

Do not attempt to wrap your head around the “science” as it is merely a way to get the characters to and from locations without waiting 1000s of years for a reality-based travel option.

Once on the planet, our team begins to realize the big mess they have landed in the middle of as evidence shows there is far more to the planet they are on than any other planet found so far.

Let’s start by saying “Infini” is a perfectly okay sci-fi movie as long as you don’t start checking its teeth. It has action, decent acting in a couple of the major roles, and sets that would have made a cheap Italian “Alien” rip-off proud. The script works as long as it keeps moving forward without letting you think too long about how the travel system doesn’t add up or why announcing a payload from a dead facility is stupid if you are attempting to sneak something under the radar, but that is minor quibbling.

The film has one of the most well-intentioned endings that has popped up in the last few years. Kind of a soft-hearted spin on “The Day the Earth Stood Still”. In fact, the ending lays its message on so thick that the filmmakers could have just slapped Huey Lewis and the News belting out “The Power of Love” over the end. Not quite as heavy-handed as the “love conquers all” type endings of “The Matrix” or “Altered States”, but almost.

The other major issue with “Infini” is the bloated run time. At least 10 minutes (although 15 to 20 would be better) could have spared the viewers some of the vaguely arthouse visual noodling. While the film is meant to, in part, be a contemplation of Humanity and what are our strengths that make our species worthy of survival, it does not have the budget or visual grandness of something like “Solaris” or “2001: A Space Odyssey”. Punching up the action while still weaving in the various backstories of the rescue team can be done without letting scenes continue minutes longer than is needed.

“Infini” is worth checking out simply because it tries for something bigger than itself, and comes fairly close to hitting that despite its budget limitations. Don’t expect a gore-filled, Michael Bay-like action fest. It’s almost a ponderous 70s sci-fi shoehorned into a 2000-era action/adventure suit, but it really needed a better tailor to make it look marvelous.