Old feels as if M Night Shyamalan watched a Christopher Nolan film like Interstellar, loved how it approached the concept of time, and thought he'd fuse that concept with his trademark style.
The result is a stupid waste of time.
It's not the worst film I've seen this year and it isn't offensively bad, but there's almost nothing redeeming about it.
The basic idea and trailer promise something intriguing that could be fun: A group of people get stuck on a beach which for some reason makes them age at an extreme speed, so they need to get away quickly, or they'll all die from old age in a matter of hours.
The actors all turn in solid performances, but terrible writing and direction really let this movie down.
To get caught up in this sort of thing, it really helps if you're rooting for the victims. It's really hard to care about human characters when they don't behave like humans do.
Early on in Old, the writing is so lazy that a character walks around asking people "What's your name and occupation?", getting an answer, then walking off. That's the most explicit example, but a lot of the dialogue is written not because the characters would actually say it, but simply because the audience needs that information and the writer doesn't really care.
Subsequently, as a viewer, I just wanted everyone to hurry up and die - which most thankfully do. But don't expect anything special about the deaths, even most of those are a bit of a bore.
Like all M Night Shyamalan movies, this one ends with what's supposed to be a big twist and it's not a spoiler to say that here a lot of that is finding out why this beach makes people grow old so quickly.
But it's a massive anticlimax. People might have walked out of The Sixth Sense going "Wow!"; but they're more likely to walk out of Old going: "Really? Is that it?"
Aside from the semi-explained beach time phenomenon, everything else that happens is so clearly signposted from the start that everyone will be able to predict it all, even if they're only half paying attention.
If you're not very smart and like to feel bright by figuring out what's going to happen in a dumb movie, this might give you that satisfaction.
If, on the other hand, you're an adult and you like good movies - then avoid Old.
One-and-a-half stars.
