Aeon Flux

The film revolves around Aeon Flux whose family was killed by government agents. She becomes eager to avenge their deaths, which seems an easy task until she uncovers something that changes everything.

Aeon is the top operative for the underground rebellion that aims to destroy the dictatorial leadership that runs the city. Her latest mission is to kill the ruler of Bregna, Trevor Goodchild. This is what she has been waiting for her entire life, to finally get her revenge on the people she thinks killed her family - but is it that simple? What she finds out in the course of her mission changes her whole view of what she thought happened. The perfect lie!

The whole world that has been created for the film is unlike most sci-fi films with the lack of the grimy, overpopulated dystopia we have come to expect. This instead appears to be a utopian society without war, hunger or disease. A perfect world?

Originally Aeon flux started out life as six 2-3 minute shorts by the Korean American animator Peter Chung shown in 1991 on MTV's Liquid Television animation show.

These first shorts had virtually no dialogue and the character of Aeon dies violently in each short, compared to the later, 1995, 30 minute episodes where she only dies once in the entire 10 episode series. These stories were not a classic good vs. evil, heroes vs. villains story but something different. Aeon became a fighter for "personal freedom" according to series creator Peter Chung.

Possibly the major difference between the animated series and the film is the two countries of Bregna and Monica that were separated by a wall and a range of cruel and ingenious traps, whereas, in the film, Monica has become a group of secret political rebels called Monicans whose aim is to kill the ruler of Bregna, Trevor Goodchild.

One of the challenges that the filmmakers had to overcome was the way to translate the Aeon Flux of the animated series to a live action Aeon and keep her true to the original character. They cast Charlize Theron as the lead as she had the perfect balance of looks and physical power to pull off such a demanding role.

The next challenge for the filmmakers was to find locations that fitted the world that they were creating. They found what they were looking for (a combination of yesterday and tomorrow) in the buildings and gardens of Berlin and Potsdam, Germany. The Bauhaus architectural style, which Walter Gropius popularized as director of the Bauhaus art school from 1919 to 1928, exemplified what the director wanted to achieve on screen. The Bauhaus belief, that the union of art and technology could bring about new social conditions through the creation of new visual surroundings, underscores the principles that guided the director's choices in creating the look of the highly controlled and contained city-state of Bregna, where ordinary citizens are constantly under surveillance and nothing is quite as it appears to be.

With clean, unbroken lines, the geometric modernism of Bauhaus design fit perfectly with the stylized but organic look of "Aeon Flux." "We're looking at the most beautiful thinking on form anywhere," production designer Andrew McAlpine said of the Bauhaus Museum, which doubles as Una Flux's apartment complex. "It's the last building Gropius ever built and we're working with some of the most pure architecture imaginable. It's a once-in-a-lifetime experience."

Location managers Christian Alexander Klempert and Matthias Braun combed the buildings and gardens of Berlin and Potsdam, and found an almost surreal combination of stunning modern and historic architectural wonders. "There were astonishing places that had never been photographed, ranging from the 1700s to the 1960s," says McAlpine, noting that, until recently, these places had been behind the Iron Curtain in East Berlin. "We had access to amazing 400-year-old architecture as well as incredible modern designs, all of which had beautiful curvatures and geometric shapes to them." The filmmakers' chosen locations include the parks and palaces of Potsdam's Schloss Sanssouci and Buga Park and Berlin's Maria Regina Martyrum.

After the exterior locations were found the filmmakers then had to find a loction to film the interior scenes from the film. They found what they were looking for 30 minutes away from Berlin. The fabled Babelsberg Studios. The Studio is no stranger to sci-fi films. Fritz Lang's groundbreaking film Metropolis was filmed there as well as the 1930 Marlene Dietrich "The Blue Angel".

After reading the critics reviews of the film and the fact that the US distributor, Paramount, didn't have any press shows before the film was released filled me with dread, as that is normally reserved for real stinkers of films. The last time I can recall this happening in the UK was for the 1998 film "The Avengers". There are going to be press screenings in the UK for the film however.

In conclusion, I cannot find anything good that is being said about the film, but I have to disagree. After watching the original series I would expect the film to be confusing to many people, especially film critics who have to watch a lot of different types of film in their job. Also I feel it will not be to everyone's taste, and probably aimed at the geek in their 30s who remember the original from MTV.

Colin Bell