Set in a world where certain people, known as Infinites, possess the ability to tap into the knowledge and abilities from their past lives, a war is being waged between two factions of Infinites. The "Believers" think this power is a gift used for the betterment of mankind, while the "Nihilists" take the power as a curse and seek to end their re-incarnation by any means necessary, including at the expense of all mankind. Evan McCauley (Mark Wahlberg), diagnosed with schizophrenia from adolescence, self-medicates with off the books deals with low level drug traders to keep himself stocked in anti-psychotics. When a deal goes bad Evan is soon arrested and is confronted by an enigmatic man named Bathurst (Chiwetel Ejiofor) who claims to be someone from Evan's past and carries ill intent towards him. Evan is rescued by Nora (Sophie Cookson), a fighter for the Believers, who rescues Evan, tells him he is an Infinite and brings him back to the believers so he can recall his past life as Heinrich Treadway (Dylan O'Brien) and locate a hidden one of a kind weapon to prevent Bathurst and the Nihilists from destroying all life on Earth to end their reincarnation cycle.
Infinite is an adaptation of the 2009 self-published novel, The Reincarnationist Papers by D. Eric Maikranz. The book is noted for Maikranz unique approach is spreading awareness by encouraging his readers to act as agents for the book and offering an award of 10% of any advance given for the movie rights to anyone who could introduce the book to a Hollywood producer which was eventually paid to junior executive Rafi Crohn. The film rights were eventually picked up by Paramount as a producing vehicle for Lorenzo di Bonaventura whom the studio had success with on their lucrative Transformers series. Director Antoine Fuqua soon became attached to the film with Chris Evans stated to headline before Evans dropped out due to scheduling issues with Apple TV's Defending Jacob and was replaced with Mark Wahlberg. Positioned by Paramount as a major blockbuster and potential franchise kick-off for the 2020 Summer movie season, the movie was pulled from release due to the ongoing pandemic and pushed around the release calendar until Paramount decided to reposition the film as an "original" for their recently rebranded Paramount+ subscription service. The movie received generally negative reviews from critics and audiences, and rightly so because Infinite is probably one of the most unengaging and dull big budget action films of recent memory.
When the movie begins we're thrown into an elaborately produced car chase in Mexico City following three characters running from someone after having acquired "something". There's no lead up to this chase save for a very brief and quick opening narration telling us about Infinites, Believers, and Nihilists and because no character or stakes have been established this major action sequence that opens the film just feels boring because we have no idea what's happening or why. We then end the sequence cutting to Mark Wahlberg's Evan McCauley who's a troubled man dealing with schizophrenia and the stigma that comes with it (as seen with a painfully on the nose job interview seen that I think is trying to come off as comedic but just feels grating) and somehow McCauley can operate and maintain a forge smithing swords for low level drug dealers despite living in a rundown apartment with no identifiable source of income. Wahlberg is a major reason why this movie doesn't work, despite looking really good for his age he was pushing 50 when he made this film and he is beginning to show it. McCauley's journey of discovering he's an Infinite is very much inspired by Neo's journey of discovering the world is an illusion in The Matrix, but because of Wahlberg's age and more hardened approach, he really doesn't fit this "finding your true self" arc all that well. In my opinion Dylan O'Brien probably should have been Evan while Wahlberg should have been treadway because O'Brien is both young enough and strong enough as a leading man, as seen in his turn as Mitch Rapp in American Assassin, that he'd feel more at home in this type of role than Wahlberg who's really too confident and strong of a presence to fit a role like this (not as bad a miscasting as The Happening, but still pretty ill judged).
Of course beyond the miscast lead, the movie has other issues in its characters and world building. The Believers and Nihilists simply do not have engaging characters or personalities with most the information being heavy expository exchanges rather than actual character or world building moments. Chiwetel Ejiofor as Bathurst has a particularly embarrassing exchange with Toby Jones that becomes unintentionally funny when he explains his motivation for wanting out of re-incarnation as "humanity as a living obituary in a dying newspaper on the floor of a bird cage in the corner of an old hoarder lady's apartment" while Toby Jones has honey force poured into his mouth and screams about "love and friendship" which just left me agasp at how ill judged this sequence with TWO brilliant actors whom I'd seen do great work now spouting some of the most inane exchanges I'd seen outside of a Star Wars prequel. The rest of the cast is pretty much non-entities with Sophie Cookson's Nora barely even registering with her core of reuniting with a lost love carrying so little weight I routinely forgot she even had a "lost love". The one performance I thought kind of worked was with Jason Mantzoukas as a neutral Infinite known as The Artisan who uses his countless lives to indulge in hedonism and never ending partying and only allies himself with the believers because if the Nihilists succeed by his words ""the party's over", on occasion the character can become a little much, but he's really the only character I'd say leaves any sort of impression because he isn't directed to be overly stoic and reserved.
The action sequences are fine for the most part as typical for Antoine Fuqua but he does feel a little restrained by the PG-13 rating as Fuqua typically is more at home with an R. Not that Fuqua can't work with PG-13 material such as his better than expected Magnificent Seven remake, but Fuqua is best known for emphasizing grit and intensity, and it feels like he's not really allowed to go full force with that style here with many of the sequences feeling like they'll feel at home in something like Bulletproof Monk or G. I. Joe Retaliation. The action is serviceable, but it's in service of such a lifeless and passionless script it's really hard to care what's going on even if it's "technically" done well.
Infinite is just boring and lifeless. With a miscast lead and a mixture of being overly simple whilst overly convoluted, Infinite takes a promising concept of tapping into past lives and runs makes it dry and without energy. While on occasion some of the exchanges verge into unintentional hilarity, most of the deliveries of dialogue are so mechanical and exposition heavy there's nothing to latch onto for engagement so you just start noticing things you've seen before and point out where they came from because you're so bored. Infinite may have had its eyes on an expanded franchise, but this is likely a "one and done" deal.
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