The movies is a beautiful thing.
Somebody’s killing aliens all around the world. Why? Why should you even care?, rebuts the trailer for I Am Number Four. You’re not going to find out in the trailer. You probably aren’t going to find out in the movie, either. They did not figure out that part of the script. They probably greenlit this movie on the name alone. I Am Number Four! How cool is that? “Can it have explosions in it?” asked producer Michael Bay, “Can it be all sizzle and no steak? Can it have a flat lead couple and a bloated central conceit? Can we hand out electrodes in the movie theater so that viewers can self-administer current directly to the pleasure centers of their brain, eventually neglecting all of their responsibilities, relationships, and basic hygiene to deliver shock after shock after shock until they die, having ignored their most basic survival drives?” Yes, Michael! Of course!
But actually: Somebody’s killing aliens. The good news is that the nine of them can only be killed in sequence. The bad news is, what the fuck? Why? The other bad news is that Alex Pettyfer Am Number Four. At the beginning of the trailer, he finds out this shocking news. “What number am I. Seven? Five?” In the trailer, he figures it out after that, but I’d like to think they cut out the rest of the scene. “Six? Eight? Nine? One? No, One’s dead. Two? Oh, shit, no, Two is also dead. Three. Am I Three? I bet I Am Number Three. Oh, jeez, you’re right, Three is dead. Do you have a legal pad so I can sort this out?” Wasn’t it fun just then to use our imaginations???
No worries, though, because Alex Pettyfer knows exactly how to blend in: By enrolling in a high school and not even coming up with a fake name. Listen, buddy, they found Number Three hiding in Jerry Bruckheimer’s logo. Ain’t no way you’re going to do better than that.
According to the trailer, “He looks like us.” He looks like us? Alex Pettyfer looks like us? Alex Pettyfer looks like he steals cheekbones for a living. I look like somebody stole my cheekbones. Alex Pettyfer looks like he was designed in a collaboration between an Italian Formula 1 R&D department and Alexander McQueen. I look like somebody took that dough they give to children to play with at Bertucci’s and shaped it into a crude approximation of a man. Alex Pettyfer looks like a slightly worse Robert Pattinson. I look like a much worse Zach Galifianakis. Who could this “us” possibly refer to? Is this movie planned for a limited release in das Vaterland? Should we be throwing Blu-Ray disks of the movie up Mount Olympus?
“You have no idea how many have made sacrifices so you could live!” Dude: Three.
In conclusion, The Covenant.
TWO STARS DUE TO GIVE ME ONE GOOD REASON WHY THIS COULDN’T HAVE BEEN A LIVE ACTION CODENAME: KIDS NEXT DOOR MOVIE.
