John Lithgow plans to survive the Apocalypse, but he can’t survive the typical script
2 years ago, as I was scrolling down the Facebook homepage, I accidentally stumbled upon an article saying the world would end on Monday. I was terrified beyond words that I has to contract that only few people I trust to confirm that it’s all a joke. My folks.
I try to avoid any articles about the Doomsday clock, and I’ve been doing pretty good at that every since.
Reason I’m telling you the truth is because the latest Indie I’m dishing on, “The Tomorrow Man,” stars John Lithgow as a man named Ed who has been preparing for a future doomsday, by having a bunker with an invisible door and a magnetic key. He acknowledges that people are less focused on humanity, because the apocalypse keeps having every decade (Y2K and all).
The plot becomes a love story, as goes to the local grocery store every day, and falls for a woman named Ronnie (Blythe Danner). He talks to her at the store, and even finds her at the general store she works at. Yes, at first, she’s a bit uncomfortable by how he approaches her (who wouldn’t be), but she begins dating him. And she even becomes the first person he’s ever shown his bunker to.
“The Tomorrow Man” offers some fine performances from Lithgow and Danner, because of how their characters struggle to overcome their own dramas. Lithgow is preparing for the end of the world, while Danner is a widow who lost both her husband and daughter.
But the movie has to be typical. There are supporting characters who are mostly cut and paste, where the most interesting is Ed’s cynical son (Derek Cecil). At least, he offers some nice work in the ways he argues with his father, and how they set aside their differences. The rest, however, just come and go without any payoff whatsoever.
The storyline gets confusing and muddled at times, due to the characteristics of the main elderly man. Judging by his behavior when he meets the woman and when he dates her, I couldn’t tell what his deal was. Maybe he has a condition, I don’t know; but when we get through the premise, we lose faith in the movie.
The performances are nice and the tenderness is sweet, but “The Tomorrow Man” is not exactly the Indie I’d see again and again. It doesn’t have the kind of sparkle it should have, and even Lithgow complained that today’s movies are not like the John Wayne pictures.
I respect that deeply.
⭐⭐️1/2
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