Popular reviews

• 

  Review by Tasha Robinson ★★½

  Smart but ultimately too inert, this science-fiction film about a body-swap program showcases a handful of things I'm really glad to see onscreen: an older Asian woman as a protagonist, a focus on a mother/daughter relationship, a cerebral metaphor about the overwhelming value of youth and money in modern society, a chilly and distinctive look, a story from a woman director. But it's almost hyperbolically slow and internal. This could have been a killer episode of Black Mirror — it has the ideas for it, and the punch. It's just dialed-down to the point that it feels sleepy when it should feel creepy. Great performances, though.

• 

  Review by 𝚮𝖆𝖗𝖑𝖊𝖖𝖚𝖎𝖓𝖆𝖉𝖊 🎃🕯️👻 ★★★ 4

  Some really cool and frightening ideas in this female-focused sci-fi film (we need more of that perspective in this genre!). It's visibly low budget but it was refreshing to watch a movie of that kind focused on mother/daughter relationship. Jennifer Ehle makes every movie she is in better, even when she has little screentime.

• 

  Review by Mr. DuLac ★★★½ 4

  There is nothing fiercer then a mother's love.
  -Isa Cryer

  Smart science fiction that challenges the viewer with ideas and social commentary on gender equality and race. Written by Jennifer Phang and Jacqueline Kim while Phang directs and Kim stars.

  What I loved is that it's commentary wasn't only about today's society, but the past and future. While women want the next generation to have it better, are their sacrifices simply a vicious cycle that continues with simply the environment changing over time?

  It's highlighted by a great performance from Jacqueline Kim in a film that suggests the same issues for women might never go away, instead certain aspects are simply more subtle while others are more extreme.

  It has as much to say about our past as our future.

• 

  Review by Steve Kimes ★★★½

  A smart film of insight that I wish had better technical skill.

  A future in which technology has expanded, but social morality has shrunk. A new ability to transfer minds into fresh, new bodies has emerged... and it becomes necessary because women have become even more sexualized, with children openly being prostitutes and older women unable to retain their work because they lack the conventional beauty they once had.

  I love the way the film explores the personal aspects of sexual oppression, and how it relates to family and one's social life. But the CGI was awful, completely distracting and the editing was choppy. Still, there was some great acting by "unconventional-looking" artists, and it is wonderful to see Asian-Americans placed in non-stereotypical lead and supporting roles.

• 

  Review by Rembrandt Q Pumpernickel ★★★ 3

  I know this is science fiction, but asking me to believe that not one but TWO women slept with Ken Jeong is too much to put on my willing suspension of disbelief.

  But seriously, like everyone else, I feel like the thematic meat of this movie deserves better lighting, editing, and acting. It is for sure one of, if not absolutely, the smartest films I've given three stars to.

• 

  Review by Chris 🦑 ★★★★ 2

  i cant describe just how refreshing it is to see asian women (plural!) in an american science fiction film but its a bit depressing to think about how this would almost surely be a favorite if it was given even a fraction of the budget of shittier scifi films (elysium, oblivion, blade runner 2049, etc. etc.) because the low budget is painfully clear and very distracting

  also bonus points for the director being mixed vietnamese!

• 

  Review by Jason Still ★★★ 3

  Cerebral, poetic & gloomy, this heavily political (aren’t they all?) near-future sci-fi fable has real purpose and borrows considerately from some of the genre greats to tell it…

  …some slightly iffy exterior CGI moments aside it looks & feels the part; the performances too are all good - so why did I not care what happened? It’s not subtle in making its point and that’s fine - like Gwen 2.0, the picture looks good but a certain consciousness of emotion was seemingly erased on transfer from the page…

  …so many good ideas, beautifully bookended and scored - but like Jules, I really needed it to tell me why I’m alive.

• 

  Review by Max ★½ 5

  Advantageous is the worst type of science fiction film. It's true science fiction in the sense that it deals with fairly thought-provoking and important ideas and themes, but the way it goes about introducing these scientific dilemmas is so horribly unwatchable. For starters, the color palette is just dull and the visual style is virtually nonexistent. Jennifer Phang's writing is much better than her direction, but the fact that I can hardly recall a single great image from this entire movie is just disappointing. The story unfolds at such a lethargic pace and it's impossible to ever feel anything for the characters because of how dryly written they are. There could have been some very effective and moving backstory for…

• 

  Review by Dara K. Marzipan

  Jennifer Phang (director and co-writer) and Jacqueline Kim (lead actress and co-writer) collaborate on the compact, capable and eerily pretty Advantageous. It's notable for being a piece of speculative sci-fi by an Asian woman director—representation matters, and more diverse points of view means more diverse stories, especially in genres normally dominated by majority voices.

  The film's plot is a familiar slice of sobering post-humanism, but its real gifts are its meditations on standards of beauty, the responsibilities of motherhood, and the crunching pressures of class warfare. I also enjoyed the attention to detail put into the near-future setting, a depressed future where bombs erupting across the city skyline are a scary, but wholly commonplace event.

• 

  Review by Mike D'Angelo ★★★

  57/100

  The Dissolve review. Admirably ambitious and very well acted (really wish I got to see Jacqueline Kim more than once a decade), but it's expanded from a short and the padding is very evident.

• 

  Review by russman ★★½

  The job market is tough

• 

  Review by Matt ★½

  Honestly right, when sci fi is good it's incredible (i adore it) but as a genre it seems so prone to being just the most boring thing in the wrong hands. There are a plethora of dismally paced stories out there that would be infinitely better if the person responsible for remembering that film is meant to entertain had, well...turned up on set for a few days.