MOVIE SCENE CANADA
O'DESSA
​I Searchlight Pictures/Disney+ I March 21, 2025 I 106 mins. I
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50%
* As of 3/19/25
CAST:
Regina Hall, Murray Bartlett, Sadie Sink
DIRECTOR(S):
Geremy Jasper
Set in a post-apocalyptic future, O’Dessa is an original rock opera about a farm girl on an epic quest to recover a cherished family heirloom. Her journey leads her to a strange and dangerous city where she meets her one true love – but in order to save his soul, she must put the power of destiny and song to the ultimate test.
REVIEW BY: Darren Zakus - 3/19/25
RATING 2.5 out of 5
O’Dessa features a great lead performance by Sadie Sink, enjoyable songs and an undeniably cool punk rock, futuristic, post-apocalyptic vision of the 1990s, but writer and director Geremy Jasper’s ambitious ideas never fully come together and sadly leave the film a disappointing punk rock opera musical experience.
There can never be enough musicals, and despite the recent streak of Broadway musical adaptations, we have been lacking original movie musicals in recent years. O’Dessa is not only an original musical, but once that embraces the rock opera archetype, a musical subgenre that does not often grace our screens. Based on an idea that writer and director Geremy Jasper has been dreaming of for almost two decades, blending the science fiction and musical genre together while telling a hero’s quest with all the psychedelic energy and flare imaginable, enter O’Dessa Galloway. The entire film is anchored by the ever talented Sadie Sink who shines brighter than all the neon lighting displayed in the film as O’Dessa, displaying both her excellent acting talents and singing ability at every turn, but sadly the rest of the film does not rise to match her caliber. From supporting cast members who are not used to their best of their abilities to an unfocused screenplay that feels like it is both taking on too much at once while very little happens in the film, you can see the potential of Jasper’s film even if it is too ambitious for what he has delivered to audiences.
Without question, the best part of O’Dessa is Sink who is incredible in the lead role. From the second the film begins, Sink captures the young, adventurous soul of O’Dessa as she travels to Satylite City, effortlessly proving herself more than capable of leading her own film. She possess the charm, courage and passion of her character that propels the film’s story and takes O’Dessa on a life changing journey as she stands against an evil tyrant and embraces her destiny, while also meeting the love of her life in Kelvin Harrison Jr.’s Euri. On top of that, Sink’s vocals are great in the songs and makes all of the songs written by Jasper and Jason Binnick come to life. The songs themselves are incredibly catchy and echo the spirit of O’Dessa and her journey, energizing the film more so than any other aspect of the film. It’s funny given the punk rock style of the film, but the best songs are the more folk based tunes “Ramblin’ Down the Road” and “Feelin’ Free” which truly showcase Sink’s singing abilities.
As good as Sink as the songs are, the rest of the film is an ambitious swing that mostly fails to connect. With this punk rock opera musical tone that Jasper is going for, that atmosphere is not generated. The costuming captures this tone, but the futuristic post apocalyptic set design that relies heavily on neon lighting feels more like a 1990s laser tag arena at times, never capturing the grit of 1980s punk rock scene. While the songs themselves are undeniably catchy and well performed by Sink and Kelvin Harrison Jr., the majority of them feel more at home in the folk and classic rock music genres rather than the punk rock vision that Jasper has for the world of the film. And when it comes to the relationship between O’Dessa and Euri, Sink and Harrison Jr. do not have much chemistry between them nor the time to develop their character’s romance, making it hard to buy into their romance especially as the pace it goes from dating to one true love is incredibly rapid to say the least.
All of these shortcomings can be traced back to Jasper’s story, which sadly does not have the time it needs to be fully developed on screen. The quick introduction sets the stage for O’Dessa’s journey and informs viewers of her family’s legacy and the prophecy she is destined to fulfill with great promise, but once she reaches Satylite City, the world building begins to crumble. Regina Hall’s Neon Dion is incredibly underused despite her giving major May Day vibes from A View to a Kill, while the lore around Murray Bartlett’s Plutonovich is never truly explored, keeping this ominous ruler largely out of the picture until the film’s final scenes. You can see the inspirations that Jasper is pulling from stories like The Wizard of Oz, Alice in Wonderland, 1984, and even the Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurydice, with comparisons to the myth’s most recent iteration as the Broadway musical Hadestown being unavoidable, but O’Dessa never captures the essence of made these other stories memorable. There is without a doubt a rich story to tell and world to develop and immerse viewers in, but within the confines of a roughly one hundred minute film, Jasper is not able to achieve his vision. With both too many plot points jammed into the film’s short runtime and simultaneously not enough rising action in the story to maintain viewer engagement over the course of the film, O’Dessa has two problems at play that should never coexist within the same film. Somewhere out there, there is an audience that is going to connect with O’Dessa, and those viewers will immediately fall in love with what Jasper and Sink have delivered, but for all other viewers, seeing this story play out in a longer television miniseries format would have given it the room it needed to fully realize its potential.
While O’Dessa is going to connect with a particular group of viewers, and I for one cannot wait for them to discover this film as it is an ambitious film that will have its passionate fans, as a whole it's not going to be enough to win over mass audiences. Geremy Jasper’s vision for this story is admirable as he blends different genres into this hero’s quest and packaged as a punk rock opera musical extravaganza, though it's a vision that never comes together in this film. Despite the spectacular lead performance from Sadie Sink who is the beating heart of the film and some incredibly catchy original songs that bring to life the musical element of the film, O’Dessa struggles to become epic science fiction, post-apocalyptic hero’s quest due to an over crowded screenplay full of great ideas, but one that is never able to deploy these ideas all at once in an engaging manner.