65

Written and directed by Scott Beck and Bryan Woods is this nuts and bolts sci-fi action adventure. Set 65 million years ago, Mills (Adam Driver) is a pilot who flies long distance space missions. His latest mission is a two year flight into deep space. During the mission his ship flies into an asteroid field forcing him to make a crash landing on an unmapped planet. As he comes around he believes all of his passengers are dead and finds himself alone on, as we’ve discovered, Earth. An Earth on which dinosaurs still rule. His situation his hopeless, until he finds one of his passengers has survived in the shape of a young girl, Koa (Ariana Greenblatt). She gives him the inspiration to treck across dangerous terrain to reach the remainder of their craft and a rescue ship, which can get them off the planet and home, before time for them and the planet runs out.

Before heading off to see 65 my wife asked “what’s it about?” My answer was “Adam Driver, Dinosaurs and a gun” and that’s all you need to know about this nuts and bolts 90 minute action adventure.

It is very predictable, Mills and Koa, start at point A and must successfully navigate their way across a hostile environment full of creatures who want to kill them to point B. If is as formulaic as that, with no real surprises. Even the catastrophic event they find themselves having to outrun is telegraphed very early on.

All that said, I got exactly what I’d expected. Disposable, dumb nonsense and has no intention of providing anything else. There is a bit of tragedy in Mills’s background and in Koa’s present, but that’s the only attempt to add some depth.

It’s a long way from been a classic but I had an enjoyable enough time. Adam Driver is always good value as is his young co-star Ariana Greenblatt. Both giving committed and enjoyable performances.

65 will not be troubling any awards judges and to be honest you’ll forget it pretty quickly. But it is what it sets out to be, a pretty basic action adventure. It’s not great, but I enjoyed it anyway and at 91 minutes it knows it limits!