Mike Cahill, the mastermind of this hokey reason-versus-faith parable, has experience in the field of the fantastic. His debut, Another Earth, introduced a fascinating Twilight Zone premise—the appearance of a celestial body, identical to our own—and then reduced it to nothing more than a planet-sized metaphor, the window dressing on a very ordinary drama of guilt and redemption. I Origins doesn’t squander its high concept quite as thoroughly—there’s a better payoff at least—but it still couches it in indie-movie clichés.
The film actually doubles as a love triangle, planting Pitt’s hipster rationalist between a superstitious mystery waif, Sofi (Astrid Bergès-Frisbey), and a fellow skeptic, his lab partner Karen (Another Earth star Brit Marling, more convincing than her co-star in a white coat). Sofi is an impossibly accommodating dream girl, a globetrotting fashion model who falls for the moodiest, most condescending geek she’s probably ever encountered. Ian meets her at a costume party, where he’s drawn immediately to her unique peepers; after fooling around in a bathroom, the two part ways without exchanging numbers, but eventually find each other through a series of grand cosmic coincidences. Their subsequent relationship unfolds like a New Wave parody, the two canoodling in endless montage—that is, when they’re not playfully sparring about spirituality. (He’s an atheist. She’s a Buddhist, sort of. They make it work.)
Around the midway mark, I Origins abruptly severs ties with one of its characters, in a way that’s wince-worthy on a couple of levels. From here, it morphs into a kind of sci-fi detective story—a direction that would prove more promising were it not predicated on a mystery many viewers will solve a good hour before the characters do. The film’s second half is a slow-motion reveal, inching with agonizing delay to a predictable final doozy. For those who guess the grand design, there will be little to do but wait for stubborn, myopic Ian to catch up. I Origins is arted-up twist cinema at its most self-important, building to an ending that’s designed to blow minds but doesn’t pack any of the emotional wallop it should. Eyes that haven’t fluttered shut will simply roll. Point them at a different movie.
