After Earth (2013) - Critic Reviews

Shyamalan’s sensibility may not be enough to turn After Earth into a great (or even very good) film, but it does yield interesting — and at times strikingly realized — results.

50

Gabe Toro The Playlist

The film progresses to the point where it feels less like father and son, and more like a young boy listening to an inspirational audiobook.

40

Austin Chronicle

The film is repetitive and not as suspenseful at it tries to be. Often gorgeous, sometimes fascinating, it is ultimately unwieldy and unsurprising. It fails as a Smith-family project. Jaden Smith, who was fine in "The Karate Kid," is flat here.

40

John DeFore The Hollywood Reporter

The disappointingly generic film, which strands a father and son on Earth a thousand years after a planet-wide evacuation, will leave genre audiences pining for the more Terra-centric conceits of "Oblivion," not to mention countless other future-set films that find novelty in making familiar surroundings threatening.

30

Scott Foundas Variety

Shyamalan is clearly a director-for-hire here, his disinterest palpable from first frame to last. Nowhere in evidence is the gifted "Sixth Sense" director who once brought intricately crafted setpieces and cinematic sleight-of-hand to even the least of his own movies.

30

Alan Scherstuhl Village Voice

Jaden is fine at running, jumping, fearful trembling, and affecting steely resolution. He doesn't yet have his father's charisma; perhaps to help him out, dad opted not to bring that charisma to the set.

25

Lou Lumenick New York Post

Basically, this is Smith and his real-life son, Jaden (both affecting ridiculous mid-Atlantic accents) talking the audience to death for something like 90 minutes before the closing credits.

25

Mick LaSalle San Francisco Chronicle

Jaden is not ready for his solo spotlight, and the film is the same action over and over. Another bad movie from Shyamalan.

25

Richard Roeper Chicago Sun-Times

Quite simply, this is one of the worst films of 2013.

0

Joe Neumaier New York Daily News

Summer 2013 has its first bomb, and sadly, it’s landed right on Will Smith.