Adam Driver can’t save 65 from extinction

Collaborators Scott Beck and Bryan Woods deliver their latest film in 65 from Sony Pictures Releasing. The duo writes and directs the film, which Adam Driver toplines. After a catastrophic crash on an unknown planet, pilot Mills (Adam Driver) quickly discovers he’s stuck on Earth… 65 million years ago. With only one chance at rescue, Mills and the only other survivor, Koa (Ariana Greenblatt), must travel across an unknown terrain riddled with dangerous prehistoric creatures in an epic fight to survive.

As a movie buff, Adam Driver is an actor who took a while to grow on me. While I respect him as a fellow veteran, there was just something about his persona I didn’t like until Star Wars Episode 7: The Force Awakens. Numerous actors such as Will Smith, Frank Grillo, and Tomy Hardy have all pulled off movies where there is a small cast. Regretfully though, Driver lacks the screen presence to carry a film of this type by himself. The scenes with his wife and daughter had potential, but the nose dive begins once he leaves to make some extra bucks to cure his sick daughter.

It wasn’t like I initially suspected Adam Driver would act like Charlton Heston and end up back at launch as an Earthling astronaut. The man behind Driver is not of today but of yesterday. In cryosleep, on its way home from some other Earth-like celestial body – with some passengers on board who are in cryosleep, wanting to get from A to B. A small cruiser crashes into an asteroid field and crashes on our dear planet during the dinosaurs’ last days. As Bethlehem’s star, the Yucatan asteroid sparkles. Adam Driver is worried about more than that. Since every passenger but one girl dies, he must bring her to the 15km escape pod. They have high-tech rifles ready as they work through an unfamiliar, menacing wilderness. 

Scott Beck and Bryan Woods consciously try to waste the film’s potential. Apart from some prestigious budget production values, 65 offers a plot you would find at Redbox, whose background story acts as a placeholder. The survival trip built on it is as predictable as the impending demise of the scaled giants, the mundane emotions, and the scenarios. This sentiment is true even at the film’s end.

Despite their best efforts, Scott Beck and Bryan Woods fail to capitalize on the film’s potential, leaving viewers with a predictable, forgettable story and all-too-familiar emotions. In the end, the plot and characters remain stagnant and underdeveloped.

Final Grade: D+

65 is in theaters now