Crater Review: A Struggle Between Child Like Joy And Dark Themes

Crater covers some seriously heavy topics, but it often feels like it is fighting against itself to maintain a sense of whimsey despite the darkness behind it all.

Director: Kyle Patrick Alvarez
Summary: Crater is the coming-of-age adventure story of Caleb Channing (Isaiah Russell-Bailey), 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 (Scott Mescudi). But before leaving to fulfill his dad’s last wish, he and his three best friends, Dylan (Billy Barratt), Borney (Orson Hong) and Marcus (Thomas Boyce), and a new arrival from Earth, Addison (Mckenna Grace), hijack a rover for one final adventure on a journey to explore a mysterious crater.

During a screening of Big Hero 6, the two young children of another critic were starting to get antsy. It was toward the movie’s end, and it seemed like they were ready to leave. When asked if they were losing interest, he explained that the film was sad, and they were afraid that it would stay sad, so they wanted to leave. It’s a uniquely “kid” way of looking at the world and one that you keep coming back to because the ending of Crater is an ending that might make young kids upset because it is very sad.

Not to get into spoilers, but this is one of those movies where there isn’t much of a moment where things get better. There is light in the darkness, but that light is incredibly dark, considering the film’s circumstances. The marketing has done an excellent job of hiding precisely what Crater is about, making it look like nothing more than a road trip movie with a bunch of fun kids. Still, the circumstances of that road trip are shrouded in a world built on labor violations and never seeing loved one’s again because this isn’t just a road trip before Caleb goes to a new planet [that he only gets to go to because his dad died], he will go into cryosleep to get to the new planet because the journey will take 100 years. By the time he wakes up, everyone he knows will be dead.

Crater doesn’t shy away from the fact that this isn’t a temporary goodbye for Caleb and that he will never see his friends again once he gets on that ship. The colony on the moon is built on the labor of the working class, and the rules they must abide by are the kind of rules that trap people so they can’t ever get out. Work for twenty years, and you get a ticket to the new planet, but they add time for everything, like being late or getting sick. Even worse, if you die before you complete your time, it is inherited by your children, like some blood debt. It is shocking how dark all of this is, and there is an excellent and deep science fiction movie somewhere in here that really explores carrying the weight of your family and knowing you might never escape this cycle.

But that isn’t what Crater focuses on. Instead, these kids do what kids do and go on one more ride across the moon because, despite living there, they have never actually been out there or anywhere besides this colony. There are hijinks, and we see the ruins of capitalism all over the moon as the kids stumble across what the moon could have been if people didn’t give up on it and decided that the workers on the colony only deserve the bare minimum. While doing this, they play silly games and explore, and the film constantly feels like it is struggling against its own concept as it tries to be lighthearted and fun. But there’s nothing lighthearted about any of this, it is devastating, and even the “happy ending” they do go with is like a knife to the chest.

For adults, teenagers, and even tweens, there is plenty to like in Crater because that world is so interesting, and they have more capacity to understand what is happening. However, young kids will revolt at this ending, which means it isn’t really a family film at the end of the day. They will want to leave the room because the movie is sad, and you don’t have any reason to stop them because the film does stay sad.

Crater also has the limitations of its own budget, which can be seen in some wonky special effects. However, this is a streaming movie, so you have to cut it a little slack when it comes to that. Streaming movies are rarely game changers, but they usually do what they set out to do and are something you might be willing to check out if you already have a subscription. They don’t drive subscription growth, but they keep people on the service after subscribing. The middle meanders a bit as the kids start to make their way toward the crater, and there are times when you have to wonder if this would have worked better as a short that really dug into the social and class commentary. The young cast does a pretty good job, with the standouts being Isaiah Russell-Bailey. What his character has to go through in this movie is something we can’t even comprehend, and he breaks your heart.

Crater is a throwback to the good old days of the Disney Channel Original Movies. The special effects are wonky, and the story sometimes doesn’t know how to get to where it wants to go, but the world that this film exists in could spark some interesting discussions with older audiences, both adults and kids. As for younger audiences? It stays sad, so they might not like the ending, and despite Crater trying to be a whimsical road trip movie, in the end, it gets you right in the feels.

Crater

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Review by Kaitlyn Booth

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6.5/10

Crater covers some seriously heavy topics, but it often feels like it is fighting against itself to maintain a sense of whimsey despite how bad everything happening is.