Ascendant (2021) - Movie Review

Independent Aussie films rarely look this good. While its very insular setting (most of it takes place in an elevator) and smaller cast (we largely stick with Charlotte Best in the lead as Aria) mean that there aren’t many spots for budget deficiencies to present themselves, this still holds up visually to just about any American film I’ve seen this year. Even the computer effects, which ramp up quite a bit as the film goes along, are genuinely impressive, whether it’s the more supernatural aspects of the characters or just the realisation of the brakes on the main elevator as they jut and throw its occupant around. But once you get past that presentation, things to start unravel very quickly.

Let’s start with the plot, which is… I’m not even sure what the plot is, quite frankly. Russian mobsters, CIA agents, twin sisters who are some sort of nature avatars with insane amounts of power of their surroundings, some Arrival-esque flashback fuckery where Aria in the past and present are somehow able to communicate… I think… and it’s all got something to do with environmentalism and how badly humanity treats the Earth, apparently. It feels like writers Antaine Furlong and Kieron Holland had a solid idea for a high-concept thriller (which is basically Devil without people freaking out about toast), but to make it feature-length, they had put all manner of different ideas into it and ended up watering down the entire thing.

It doesn’t help that, even when taken purely on a scene-by-scene basis, this isn’t nearly as compelling as the visuals and soundtrack insist that it is. A lot of the film amounts to literal torture on two different fronts, with Aria being slammed between the floor and the ceiling of the elevator as it speeds downwards from increasingly-high levels, while a screen shows her father being tortured (Water-boarding, electrocution, cutting off of fingers; all your favourite flavours are available). This all taking place in the middle of a series of quite confusing flashbacks doesn’t help its case, but there’s only so much dread to be gotten out of seeing this repeatedly happen to characters that aren’t exactly making a massive impact on the audience, for reasons that are frustratingly difficult to discern.

At my best estimate, this is basically a superhero origin story, putting Aria in a physically and emotionally taxing situation where she needs to regain her former power and use it to save someone close to her. And if it were just that, I could easily see this working very well. It has the CGI chops to back up how crazy-powerful Aria becomes, and the rest of the presentation is all primed to tell a good story. But it’s just too ambitious for its own good, trying to tap into so many different story elements and ideas that it collapses under its own weight, setting up a mystery where even less becomes clear once everything is concluded.