BLISS: A Science Fiction Misfire

If you’re a fan of mind-mending science fiction, then you should probably know writer/director Mike Cahill. Part of a trio of filmmakers to emerge from Georgetown University, their unusual and quite frankly cloistered development means their projects don’t follow traditional Hollywood formulas. Cahill himself burst onto the scene with 2011’s Another Earth, a movie co-written with and starring fellow Georgetown buddy Brit Marling that made the possibility of alternate universes quite literal. Marling would go on to devote more time working with the other member of the trio, Zal Batmanglij, on projects like The East and The OA while Cahill would move forward on his own with the ambitious misfire I Origins. 

Seven years later and Cahill is back with his third feature, one that needs to right the ship on his career and seems to be a return to familiar territory. Much like Another Earth, Bliss posits an alternate reality of sorts, one fueled by either colorful drugs or a computer simulation. Greg (Owen Wilson) was drowning in their dreary world before meeting Isabel (Salma Hayek), and instead of watching his mistakes pile up around him he escapes into her assertion that everything around them is fake while the “real” real world is a blissful paradise.

The movie wants to be a puzzle box, one that reframes your view on life so you can examine it from a different angle. Like everything else Cahill does it’s ambitious and incredibly hard to pull off, and in fitting with the trajectory of his career, it’s pretty much a mess. The question of which world is real isn’t hard to sort out and what it brings to its examination of Greg’s faults aren’t exactly novel. The biggest mystery turns out to be how it’s simultaneously so inventive and boring, and the answer comes down to a lack of fundamental investment.

Attention Where Attention is Due

Cahill is clearly drawn to high concept science fiction. He wants to mess with your head and elicit deep thought, and he knows most of the building blocks needed to get there. That one-line hook? Yeah, the world might not be real. Flashy visuals that make your jaw drop? Just check out the skating rink scene. A human at the center of the story that you’re rooting for? Well, there’s the problem.

For all the strong world-building, Cahill doesn’t devote the same attention to Greg and Isabel. They get lost in the madness of the world, whipped around by the narrative strings being pulled and, quite frankly, rolling with everything far too easily.

This is a world where a woman shows up with telekinetic powers and Greg just… has a drink with her. There’s barely a pause for this life-altering revelation, never mind the numerous times this movie passes on Wilson’s trademark “wow” (seriously, this movie should’ve provided enough for its own supercut).

There’s an argument to be had that Greg’s lackluster response is due to the movie’s primary metaphor: drug addiction. Even before meeting Isabel it’s clear that Greg has a drug problem that’s pushed away his family and made him numb to the world around him. That numbness, though, is something Cahill needed to workaround. Greg might be numb but the audience shouldn’t be. We need to care about Greg and Isabel making healthy choices, ones that will push them out of the vortex of existing between two worlds, whether the imaginary world is the world they’re in or the blissful one they retreat to.

This never happens because the characters act like puppets instead of believable human beings. They never make decisions that would complicate the plot or are consistent with the people they’re supposed to be. They’re cogs in the narrative Cahill has constructed, and as such, there’s not much reason to care about them. That means it’s all on the world around them to maintain your interest in the film.

Almost Saviors

Luckily, not everything about Bliss is without merit. Cahill has put a lot of work into this world and it shows in flashes of invention that bring genuine delight.

The aforementioned scene at the skating rink is a perfect example of the premise being used to its full advantage. It begins as a light, frolicking moment where Greg embraces Isabel’s assertion that their world isn’t real. He begins to try out the telekinetic powers they have, punishing anyone who misbehaves by dropping them on their butts. Wilson and Hayek play this as a goofy delight, their ability to draw you in shining through momentarily before the narrative pulls their characters out from under them. Misbehaving, though, eventually takes on a loose definition, and the chaos they cause moves from righteous hilarity to cruelty. Hayek is there to whisper that it’s not cruel if everyone around them is a computer simulation, but Greg’s still not sure what’s real or not (and neither is the audience).

It’s in this uneasy moment that the movie hums at the frequency it needed to hit throughout. The seduction of no consequences offered by Hayek is an interesting twist on an addiction drama. There’s a clear allure to the descent as Wilson‘s belief provides absolution from failures he can’t undo. When Bliss brings these ideas to the fore, like in the scene at the skating rink, you can see everything Cahill was trying to achieve with the premise. But he doesn’t sustain this feeling, showing his hand far too early in regards to its central metaphor and what’s really going down. Without that uncertainty, the sadness of Greg and Isabel’s existence takes over, or it would if he had built any reason to care about these people. Instead, what comes is indifference, his point being made far too early to sustain the film.

Conclusion: Bliss

Too caught up in its own inventive twist on the world, Bliss offers high concept science fiction without tying it to something meaningful. All the strong world-building can’t sustain a movie with a lifeless protagonist and an obvious metaphor, and eventually, the movie sags under its misplaced weight.

What do you think is important in high concept science fiction? What are some of your favorites? Let us know in the comments!

Bliss is out now on Amazon Prime.

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