Geostorm

Absurdist sci-fi has the weather ruining everybody’s good time, so American know-how steps up and creates a “Thermospheric” satellite network to curb catastrophic flooding, drought and hurricanes. Immediately 17 other countries want their piece of the pie and the International Space Station becomes guardian of a global surveillance system. After sabotage results in the death of a scientist and Madrid is nearly wiped out by unbearable heat while Afghanistan suffer a killer frost, the call goes out for Jake Lawson (Gerard Butler) to be brought back on board to straighten things out. Only problem, Jake can’t deal with red tape and has retired to Orlando to be with his obnoxious teenage daughter who doesn’t understand why he refuses to talk to his younger brother Max. Then the film – which has been set up to be a conspiracy thriller disguised as a sci-fi actioner – becomes the Smothers Brothers relating Cantore stories! Utterly ridiculous scenes of massive space debris that never poses any threat to Earth and an egg frying on a Tokyo sidewalk. These people should have to deal with Atlanta weather on a regular basis – and the inside joke here is it’s reported that Atlanta is spared any weather-related damage from the events.

[PG-13]