My Cultural Diet

In the not-too-distant future, a woman named Gus (Karen Allen of Indiana Jones fame) is driving an advanced AI-powered truck through the countryside as part of an elaborate cross-country race. When she ends up off-course after her guidance system fails, she encounters a mysterious drifter (French rock star Johnny Hallyday) who becomes her only hope for completing the race and overcoming the sinister forces arrayed against them. At first, this French-German production looks like yet another post-apocalyptic road movie in the same vein as Mad Max, but as it unfolds, it’s hard to shake the feeling that the filmmakers had no idea what sort of story they were actually telling. There are glimmers of good ideas throughout Terminus, but it’s so vague and uneven, and its characters and their motivations so threadbare, that none of those ideas ever really materialize. What makes Terminus even more frustrating is that it does boast some cool images and production design, starting with the (I think) good guys’ neon-lit underground base. Unfortunately, the film’s style, which looks surprisingly modern at times, never overcomes or even balances out its lack of substance.

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