November 30, 2024
by Carla Hay
Directed by George Nolfi
Culture Representation: Taking place in Colorado, the sci-fi action film “Elevation” features a cast of African American and white characters, who are survivors of a creature-invasion apocalypse on Earth.
Culture Clash: A man and two women race against time to get medical supplies for the man’s 8-year-old son, while the adults battle the creatures, which cannot live above 8,000 feet.
Culture Audience: “Elevation” will appeal mainly to people who are fans of stars Anthony Mackie and Morena Baccarin and don’t mind watching sci-fi movies that have derivative and sloppy storytelling.
“Elevation” is a misleading title for a movie with below-average storytelling. This sci-fi action flick, which takes place during an Earth apocalypse caused by giant creatures, has competent acting but is substandard in everything else. “Elevation” introduces multiple concepts but leaves many different questions unanswered by the end of the film.
Directed by George Nolfi, “Elevation” was written by John Glenn, Jacob Roman and Kenny Ryan, who filled the screenplay with a lot of dimwitted scenarios, boring dialogue and exposition dumps. The movie was filmed on location in Colorado, where “Elevation” is supposed to take place somewhere in the Rocky Mountains area. The story begins three years after an apocalypse where mysterious giant creatures (which look like a combination of lizards and scorpions) rose up from the underground and killed 95% of Earth’s population in just one month. The apocalypse has left the survivors with no electricity or modern communication.
This worldwide massacre is not seen in any flashbacks. All that is seen in “Elevation” are how survivors in this part of Colorado are living and trying not to get killed by the creatures, which the survivors are calling “reapers.” The reapers have one big physical limitation: They cannot survive in any space that’s at least 8,000 feet above the ground. Anything below 8,000 feet on Earth is called “below The Line,” where the reapers live. People who venture below The Line are at great risk of being killed by a reaper or reapers.
The Lost Gulf Refuge, which has a population of 193 people, is 8,460 feet above the ground. Among the Lost Gulf Refuge residents are a brave widower named Will (played by Anthony Mackie); Will’s 8-year-old son Hunter (played by Danny Boyd Jr.); a hard-drinking and cranky physicist named Nina Richmond (played by Morena Baccarin); and Will’s good-natured close friend Katie (played by Maddie Hasson), who was the best friend of Will’s deceased wife Tara (played by Rachel Nicks). Tara is seen in some flashback scenes in the movie.
“Elevation” begins by showing that Hunter has gone 260 feet below The Line in the wooded area, even though he knows it’s strictly forbidden for him to be there. And you know what that means: Hunter gets chased by a reaper. He narrowly escapes death by throwing himself into an area on the ground that is surrounded by a circle of white rocks.
In another part of the movie, certain characters also are able to survive a chase from reapers in the woods by going to an area that is surrounded by a circle of white rocks. “Elevation” is so terribly written, the movie never explains why these areas surrounded by circles of white rocks give special protection from the reapers. And there’s no explanation for who put those rocks there and why the people being chased just happened to know that these rock circles give special protection.
When Hunter goes back home after escaping from being killed by a reaper, he gets scolded by Will for making the life-risking choice to go below The Line. “I just wanted to see other people,” Hunter explains. Katie is sympathetic to Hunter and says to Will: “We may be safe up here, but this mountaintop is like a prison to him.” Will says he knows the real reason why Hunter went back to a specific area in the woods below The Line is because it was the last place where Hunter saw his mother Tara.
Concerned father Will soon has something bigger to worry about than this act of rebellion from Hunter. Hunter uses an oxygen tank at night, and their household is almost out of filters for the tank. These filters are necessary for Hunter to survive. Will knows that he can probably find unused filters at an abandoned hospital in the city of Boulder. However, Boulder is about 2,000 feet below The Line.
It’s explained early on in the movie that Nina is the only known human who has been able to kill a reaper. She’s been obsessed with trying to find a scientific way to kill these creatures and sharing that knowledge with people so she can be credited with literally saving the world. Nina is an abrasive loner who abuses alcohol, so she hasn’t been making much progress with her research.
Still, when it comes time for Will to make his dangerous trek to Boulder, he asks Nina go with him. Will persuades her by saying, “All you can think about is killing one of these things, and you need something from down there to do it. You owe me this much, for Tara.”
Will and Nina have a tense relationship because he blames her for Tara’s death, for reasons that are explained in the movie. Maddie also dislikes rude and arrogant Nina. At one point, the two women get into a physical fight.
Nina makes an insulting remark by saying to Maddie: “You want to fuck your best friend’s husband.” Maddie responds by punching Nina. Maddie also accuses Nina of only wanting the kill the reapers so that Nina can be famous. This is the type of cattiness that looks like it belongs on a tacky reality show, not a sci-fi movie that’s supposed to be suspenseful.
Will, Nina and Maddie arm themselves with military-styled rifles that they get from a guy named Tim (played by Tyler Grey), who hands them the weapons from a back room in his store, with no questions asked and no signs of a transaction being made. It all looks so phony. Even though it’s made clear in the movie that the reapers can’t be killed (only wounded) by the ammunition in these guns, these are the best weapons available to Will, Nina and Maddie at the time.
On the way to Boulder, there is more bickering between Will, Nina and Maddie. And then, the inevitable happens: The reapers appear. There are encounters with the reapers that involve trying to escape on ski lifts, inside a mine shaft, and in a truck.
One of the biggest problems with “Elevation” is that many of the action scenes look fake—not just with the visual effects but also with how everything is staged. At the mine shaft, helmets with flashlights are conveniently there for Will, Nina and Maddie to wear. The ski lifts are conveniently not rusty.
When they go in the mine shaft, Will has a vague idea that there will be a tunnel leading to the hospital. But why would they go in a mine shaft when they know these creatures have a tendency to live and thrive underground? None of it really makes any sense because the entire movie is just a poorly conceived story that rips off some aspects of 2018’s “A Quiet Place,” another apocalypse movie with giant creatures that have a big physical liability.
The production design for “Elevation” is off-kilter. Most of the buildings looks desolate and shabby, as they should during a massive disaster such as an apocalypse that started three years ago. But during the trek to Boulder, there are scenes where the travelers stay overnight in a lodge that looks pristine and picture-perfect, with a cozy library full of books in the lounge area and beautifully lit candles everywhere. (There are no lodge employees in sight.) You’d never know there’s an apocalypse going on, with shortages of food and other resources, just by looking at how clean and well-stocked this lodge is.
In reality, this lodge would have been looted or destroyed a long time ago, based on how an earlier scene makes a big deal out of showing that something as simple as a box of macaroni (which Will gets from a store to make mac and cheese for Hunter’s birthday) is scarce in this post-apocalyptic world. And speaking of food, during this trip to Boulder, which takes place over at least two days, the travelers are never seen worried about how they’re going to get their next meal in this world that has food shortages. It’s as if the “Elevation” filmmakers wanted to erase any need for the characters to have these basic life necessities because the movie becomes so focused on the not-very-convincing action scenes.
Perhaps the most disappointing aspect of the plot in “Elevation” is a surprise reveal that comes toward the end of the movie. It’s supposed to be shocking information, but the information is dropped like a bomb and never addressed again. And the movie has a laughably bad way of presenting a certain solution to the reaper problem. “Elevation” has a talented cast that deserves much better than this low-quality dreck that most viewers will forget quicker than it takes for a reaper to kill someone in the movie.
Vertical released “Elevation” in U.S. cinemas on November 8, 2024. The movie was released on digital and VOD on November 26, 2024.
