Crater – Review
105 Minutes, Rated PG
Written by John Griffin
Directed by Kyle Patrick Alvarez
**NOTE: this post may be updated with audio once we actually have the chance to talk about it. Until then, you can read Mark’s review below. Remember, though, you can listen to all our discussions of this and every other movie directly over on ACAST. Stay tuned.**
Synopsis:
Crater is the coming-of-age adventure story of Caleb Channing, who was raised on a lunar mining colony and is about to be permanently relocated to an idyllic faraway planet following the death of his father. But before leaving, to fulfill his dad’s last wish, he and his three best friends, Dylan, Borney, and Marcus, and a new arrival from Earth, Addison, hijack a rover for one final adventure on a journey to explore a mysterious crater.
Well, I have to admit, I haven’t been of an age to take a crazy adventure with my friends for quite a while…
…although I kind of think age shouldn’t be a limit on having an adventure with your friends.
Anyway, Crater, despite not being made for me specifically, does carry an appeal to those of us who still think of ourselves as young-at-heart.
What feels at first like an almost Disney Channel-esque, after-school-special kind of narrative, does take a kind of more mature turn halfway through. Hitting on themes of class, debt, control, family, and death, Crater presents a world (a lunar world, but a world) where the problems that have plagued mankind for generations still persist.
Sometimes, Crater gets a little heavy-handed in its presentation of real issues, and this is probably to make it more palatable or understandable to its target audience. I’d like to think kids are smart enough to handle a certain amount of nuance, but Disney doesn’t pay me to write their content, do they?
A large part of the marketing for Crater is stressing McKenna Grace being in it, and although she does play an important role, the film focuses more on the relationship between Caleb and Dylan before Caleb is forced to leave the lunar colony for Omega, where humanity has been moving for decades, but which is a 75-year journey in suspended animation.
I’m not familiar with their previous work, but like so many, I’ve been watching McKenna Grace grow up on screen (starting with seeing her opposite Chris Evans in Gifted, which I recommend, by the way, along with the incredible Troop Zero). In Crater, you can see remnants of that snarky child while also seeing the maturing young actress she is becoming.
Don’t think I’m running down her cast-mates, though. they perform their roles admirably, as teen boys torn between who they are and who they will become.
Still, this is a Teen/YA movie, and it plays like it most of the time. The visual effects range from fine to pretty good, which is more than the film needs to get its points across.
All in all, Crater is an enjoyable diversion, one I can easily recommend.
Crater hits Disney+ Today, May 12 and stars Isaiah Russell-Bailey, Billy Barratt, Thomas Boyce, Hector, Orson Hong, and McKenna Grace.
And remember, if the BEST thing you can say about a movie is that it’s “visually stunning,” then they’ve done something wrong.
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