The Adam Project (2022) Movie Review
The Adam Project (2022) is another outing from the director-actor duo Shawn Levy and Ryan Reynolds, who gave us Free Guy last year, a movie I loved. With the premise being that in the future time travel exists and a fighter pilot goes back in time to team up with his younger self to save the future, I had to give this a try. While not on the same level of enjoyment as Free Guy, this one turned out to be another success for the duo. Interestingly, while looking at the director’s filmography before putting down my thoughts about this movie, I had no idea I have watched several of the films he directed and pretty much all of them were enjoyable to some extent with my favourites being Real Steel (2015) and Night at the Museum (2006). The dude might not be making masterpieces but he sure has consistency for a good time from my experience.
Anyway, the style and tone of the movie pay homage to the 80s sci-fi or fantasy family films or Spielbergian feel, without actually taking place in the 80s. I’m a fan of that era so I was hooked pretty much from the start. The action, the SciFi stuff, the production quality, it’s all decent. CGI can be a bit wonky at times but it wasn’t inconsistent to the point that it was annoying a lot of times save for one thing that I’ll mention later on.
The strongest point about the movie is what it had to nail in order for the experience to work i.e the relationship between Ryan Reynold’s character Adam and his younger self, acted wonderfully by Walker Scobell. The kid rocked, I loved him and he genuinely felt like a young Ryan Reynolds and the banter between him and his older self was hilarious and endearing. I also enjoyed the aspect of connecting to your younger self as one grows old instead of forgetting it, the idea that one should keep the inner child so that one doesn’t grow cold and heartless after being drenched in responsibilities as an adult, which just happens to be one of the core messages of one of my favourite books i.e The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery.
Ryan Reynolds himself was good in the role and he sold it well as a person who has unresolved issues from his past, particularly with his father. The movie, in general, surprised me with the performances. Even if certain actors didn’t have a lot of screentime, they utilized that time effectively instead of phoning it in for an easy paycheck, whether it was Jennifer Garner or Zoe Saldana or Mark Ruffalo. Certainly a strong emphasis on the emotional side of things which I appreciated given the story of the movie.
The weakest aspect that brought the movie down a notch or two was the villain and the final act. Catherine Keener wasn’t bad in the role but she wasn’t given a lot to work with. She also had a younger self who was poorly de-aged and that was distracting every time she was onscreen. The finale felt rushed and lazily written relative to the rest of the movie as if they wanted to get it over with and go to the ending and the wholesome message. Ironically, it would have made the catharsis better had there been more stakes and tension in the final struggle.
Overall, despite its faults, I had a good time with this movie. It won’t blow your mind, it is not groundbreaking, but it is an easily digestible fun wholesome time and if you're looking for something like that, give it a try. It’s on Netflix too. And if I were to rate it, I’d give it a 7/10.
