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The Darkest Minds Review – Spoiler Free

By Bryan Weatherall | August 19, 2018

The Darkest Minds Review – Spoiler Free

The Darkest Minds is a film which comes directed by Jennifer Yuh Nelson who some may know for her work on Kung Fu Panda 1 & 2. The film is based on a book of the same name written by Alexandra Bracken. The film stars Amandla Stenberg, Mandy Moore, Harris Dickinson and Miya Cech. The film is set in a world devastated by a virus which has wiped out many people. Some teenagers are immune and have survived, but they all have super powers and everyone who doesn’t is terrified of them!

When I first started seeing the trailers for this film I initially was confused and thought it was something to do with the X-Men. But in fact it has nothing to do with that franchise and is based instead on a book by Alexandra Bracken of the same name. What you can expect from The Darkest Minds as a film is something similar to what we had with the Maze Runner series or The Hunger Games. The world has gone bad, the government and the people in charge are insane and the kids are rising up and it’s revolution time!

For the most part I enjoyed my experience with The Darkest Minds. The story and the way the plot unfolds is quite interesting and the main character which we follow, Ruby, slowly develops over time. Where the plot has some problems is with its villain. While there is some threats to Ruby during her adventure as she tries to discover her powers and who she is, I never felt the threat was strong enough throughout the film. But the themes within the story about self discovery, personal development and the importance of an individual in society all come through quite strong and this was an area of the film that was a massive plus. In fact, I’m very interested in reading the book after seeing this film.

As far as the acting goes. There’s a lot of teenage actors in this film and most of them are fairly unknown. At times I felt some people were a bit hit and miss, with some never really making an impact at all. Some scenes to me seemed a little awkward to watch. But the film’s lead actor, Amandla Stenberg, stood out above the rest. You may recognise Amandla as Rue from The Hunger Games, although she’s grown up now. I thought she was actually quite a good actress and I’m hoping we get to see more from her in the future.

The action scenes aren’t the greatest you’ll experience at the cinema this week as there’s strong competition in that area from The Meg, The Spy Who Dumped Me and Mission: Impossible: Fallout. All of which are a little better than this unfortunately if you’re looking for a pure action film option this weekend at the cinema. But for what it’s worth, the level of action in this is satisfactory for the story it is trying to tell.

Overall this is an interesting film to watch at the cinema this weekend and may be worth seeing if you’re a fan of Alexandra Bracken’s book. Amandla Stenberg does a great job in the lead role and I’m hoping we get to see a lot more from this actress in the future. If you’re looking for a supernatural film to see at the cinema this weekend then this might be the best choice for you, but maybe not so if you’re looking for a pure action experience. The plot is well enough told and there’s more than enough interesting themes within it for you to discuss with friends. The movie will be of greater interest to anyone that’s a teenager and as something made for that audience to watch, I think that audience will enjoy it the most.