In a famous put-down, Pauline Kael once referred to The Sound of Music as “The Sound of Money,” implying that the film’s expensive production values distracted from any of its virtues. I was reminded of her line when I watched a couple of recent releases, Christopher Nolan’s Dunkirk and Luc Besson’s Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets. These are handsome, rousing movies that provide the biggest sense of spectacle that money can buy, and neither lets you forget how much was spent in the service of its spectacle. Dunkirk is a serious WWII film while Valerian is an unserious space opera, yet both encourage viewers to ooh and ah at the detailed, large-scale imagery, with characterization getting lost in the fray.
It doesn’t help that all the players in the film seem bored by their roles. Dane DeHaan and Cara Delevingne, who play the leads, are especially wooden, failing to generate even the slightest chemistry. As a result, one appreciates Valerian for its incidental details, like the design of the alien races or the intergalactic tchotchkes that litter the various environments. These details—the product of countless production designers and digital artists—sustain one’s interest for a while, but not enough to keep the movie from feeling like a slog at two hours and 17 minutes. In the end, the spectacle feels oppressive, not unlike having Valerian‘s entire budget dumped on top of your head. Still, if you’re going to see Valerian at all, you should probably see it on a big screen in order to admire the intricate comic-book vistas. Perhaps the best approach is to watch it until you get tired of it, then sneak into whatever’s playing next door at the multiplex.
