Archetype (2011) Poster

(2011)

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6/10
Great tease but just a tease.
PaxD7510 April 2021
I want to rate this a 10. The acting, the CGI... perfect, just perfect. I even loved the battle droid's voice - very human and as a result, conveyed the kind of pain and raw emotions it(?) was dealing with.

The issue: it turned into a tease. It's a 5 minute short and while it conveyed a tremendous amount of information, in the end, the video wasn't meant for us. It was meant to impress the writer/director's future employers.

It left us hanging when an extra minute or two could have made a great (self-enclosed) short story (and still impressed future employers). It's not unlike a TV series that isn't sure it's going to get renewed.

They end the season on a major cliffhanger (screwing over their most loyal fans - on purpose). The purpose of which is to manipulate the viewers to fight for them - when simply writing a great series ending would have achieved even better results (and long-term good will).

Video = 10 rating. Feeling used and manipulated = 1. Overall = 6 rating.
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9/10
Amazed and hungry for more
sandtrail_neelix30 June 2012
I came upon this short by accident, and it was definitely a lucky one. Now, I must admit, I am a big SF-fan, so my judgement is a bit clouded. But: Wow! In just 7 minutes a whole interesting landscape of characters, time-lines and current state of society is depicted with stunning detail.

Aaron Sims and crew made this short as a low-budget cry-for-attention-of-Hollywood. Luckily, it worked. The amazing work they portrayed and showed in this has earned them the opportunity to make a full feature. I will be one of the first to watch it, and hope all who try this short as a teaser will feel exactly the same.

I couldn't give it a 10, because of the painful feeling of I-need-to-see-more it left me with.
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nice
Kirpianuscus4 April 2019
A nice Sci-Fi. First- for the premises. Second - for suggestion of a great story. Not the last - for the science to explore a subject who is not real used by the genre. A seductive film, interesting for the manner to propose the basic pieces. To short for impress, enough for give a reasonable story, with few touching nuances.
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4/10
Solid start, but sadly decreased in quality then
Horst_In_Translation14 April 2019
Warning: Spoilers
"Archetype" is an American 7-minute live action short film from 2011, so almost a decade old now, maybe even more than that depending on when you read this review. Writer and director is Aaron Sims who you normally rather find in the art department. It is a sci-fi movie and in the center of it all we got a robot developing a guilty conscience and questioning the actions he is instructed to do. Oh well, this is only the first half of the film and the better half in my opinion. The idea is okay and Robert Joy shows why he is an actor who has been cast so many times already. In the second half, the level declines unfortunately and the only thing somewhat memorable there are Elle Newlands' looks, but also she has been a prolific actress and even appeared in some really big blockbusters. Only in very small positions, but still. Back to this film: The idea that it is all just a simulation may not have been the wisest choice here. Still it is a tolerable science fiction film I guess. Watch it if you like the genre and maybe you will enjoy it more than I did, maybe you will hate it, depends on your subjective taste I assume. One thing it is definitely not is a failure. But also it is not good enough for a positive recommendation. A bit of a pity they did not manage to keep the quality from early on. The cast list here looks really big, but yeah let me assure you there is focus on 3 characters max, probably 2 only if you don't count the female in the second half who is more means to the story than an independently existing character. My suggestion is to skip the watch. Not recommended.
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Completely pointless
Ithilfaen2 May 2014
Another example of everything that can go wrong with sci-fi. You would expect a short to focus on story instead of special effects but not this time. This plays like the first line of a script someone was writing before the power ran out... and they just thought they'd go ahead and produce it as was. There's not even enough to prime a story, it's like hearing the first 4 words of a joke. And not a terribly clever or original one.

As if that wasn't bad enough, the execution is also pretty bad. The direction is banal. The acting is terrible, especially the robot's voice.

Nothing there. Hell, the ending credits have more creativity than the rest of it. And they should, they account for half of the total runtime.
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