Last Saturday, I was browsing through the list of movies on several cable TV channels and noticed there was this title that I never heard, which premiered for the first time. When I read the synopsis and the stars name that included Benedict Cumberbatch, it immediately intrigued me and I decided to give this a try. So what was the movie all about? Let's get on to it now.
Brief Story Line
Set in the 19th century, Thomas Alva Edison (Benedict Cumberbatch - Doctor Strange, The Grinch 2018 version etc), was a famous inventor with several inventions such as the light bulb, Phonograph and also the electricity using Direct Current (DC). He had a young and trusted assistant named Samuel Insull (Tom Holland - Onward, Spider-man in MCU etc) and a lovely family who fully supported him.
Meanwhile a wealthy businessman named George Westinghouse (Michael Shannon - Knives Out, Revolutionary Road etc) was also interested in doing electricity business. After being rejected by Edison to cooperate, George with his team also created the Alternative Current (AC) and served as alternate electricity which was cheaper than DC.
They both were then involved in a "war" to prove which electricity was better even by using dirty methods. Things got further complicated when another inventor named Nikolas Tesla (Nicholas Hoult - X-men: Dark Phoenix, Jack the Giant Slayer etc) came into the picture and somehow got in the middle of their war.
So what would happen to all of them? Find it all in this drama inspired by true events.
End of Brief Story Line
This movie's first few minutes was pretty interesting to me, but it suddenly spiraled into something so fast that it was a bit hard to keep track. The introduction of the two main characters were not done in detail and audience were expected to immediately know them without proper context. Honestly after that rather terrible first few minutes to my opinion, I was really tempted to just switch to another channel, but I kept on continuing the movie. After a while when the pace seemed to be slowing down a bit, and more background story was shown on Edison and Westinghouse, it became a lot more enjoyable.
The "war" itself was pretty interesting and exciting. It made me think how little knowledge I had about the history of electricity. Even the name of George Westinghouse was unfamiliar to me, though Edison and Tesla were very familiar names to me. And the good thing after seeing the movie till finished, I became a bit more knowledgeable about them, plus few surprising facts that I got to know later during the pre-closing credits with some information about the characters.
Aside from the 2 main people who were at war, Tesla who was played by Nicholas Hoult (the second time I saw him as a real-life character after the movie Tolkien where he played J.R.R. Tolkien, the author of famous Lord of The Rings & The Hobbit) was also an interesting character but did not get enough screen time (or perhaps he was more like a distraction?). I liked Cumberbatch portrayal in this movie and Shannon as the strong willed Westinghouse. Oh there were also other real life and interesting people such as Franklin Pope, J.P Morgan, even Samuel Insull. And that part relating to the electric chair was a really interesting turn of event.
The movie itself was pretty exciting for me during the current war and the ending part (that final invention of Edison actually blew my mind). There was one rather emotional moment as well. But the early part was something that I thought could have been done a lot better. Btw, from what I read in the internet, there was a director's cut which was 10 minutes longer than the one I watched on TV with 107 minutes duration. According to the critics reviews, the director's cut version was a lot better than the one released commercially. Too bad I did not get the chance to watch it.
Overall I thought this one was not too bad. Some things were nice to watch, but I agree with most opinion that it was not powerful enough, even though it had great cast. There seemed to be the element of really strong characterizations missing in here. However, if you just focus on the current war, I think this movie should be more entertaining. Anyway, this could be an interesting choice while you are staying at home during this challenging times, especially if you are a fan of movie inspired by true events.
Mike's movie moments rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
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