The Darkest Minds (film)

The Darkest Minds is an American science fiction action film directed by Jennifer Yuh Nelson from a screenplay by Chad Hodge. The film will be released in theaters and IMAX. It is based on Alexandra Bracken's young adult novel of the same name. The film stars Amandla Stenberg, Mandy Moore, and Gwendoline Christie. It was released on August 3, 2018 to negative reviews from critics.

Storyline[]

When children and teens mysteriously develop powerful new abilities, they are declared a threat by the government and detained. Sixteen-year-old Ruby, one of the most powerful young people anyone has encountered, escapes her camp and joins a group of runaway teens seeking safe haven. Soon this newfound family realizes that, in a world in which the adults in power have betrayed them, running is not enough and they must wage a resistance, using their collective power to take back control of their future.

Plot[]

Tenatively taken from Wikipedia

A sudden disease, known as Idiopathic Adolescent Acute Neurodegeneration, or IAAN, kills over 90% of the children under 18 throughout the world, leaving the remaining survivors with unusual abilities. As a result, the governments of the world place the survivors in an internment camp, where they attempt to cure the children of their disease, distinguishing them into classes based on their abilities.

Ruby Elizabeth Daly celebrates her tenth birthday with her family, where her father, Jacob Daly, gives her a keychain. Seeing her parents' concern about IAAN, Ruby tries to comfort her mother in the night, touching her hand, and inadvertently erasing all her memories with Ruby. In the morning, her mother locks Ruby in the garage; having no recollection of her, she sends Ruby to an rehabilitation camp, Thurmond, where Ruby is determined to be an orange, one of the most dangerous classes where they have the abilities to control other people's minds and memories. Ruby uses her abilities to convince the doctor testing her that she is a green, the least dangerous ones with extremely high intelligence.

Six years later, the Children's League sends Catherine "Cate" Connor undercover into Thurmond under the name Cate Begbie. Cate arrived in time to rescue Ruby from Thurmond, who had recently been discovered as an orange thanks to the Psi Special Forces running an experiment on the camp. They had managed to discover certain frequencies of Calm Control could only be heard by one color.

The two make their way to a gas station, where Cate provides Ruby with a pendant that can be activated into a tracker, in the case she is in danger. Cate introduces her to an associate of the League; a suspicious Ruby makes her escape from the station with a little girl named Suzume (Zu) Kimura, a yellow girl who had just escaped from her camp, Caledonia. Suzume, shortened to Zu, introduces Ruby to her friends, Liam, a blue, and Charles, known as Chubs, a green, who agreed to let Ruby join them as they try to make their way to a safe haven, led by another orange "Slip Kid".

The group heads to an abandoned mall to gather supplies, where they cross paths with another group of survivors, who give a clue about the haven's location, through the letters 'EDO'. Chubs deduces that they are actually numbers '540', which lead to a radio transmission, revealing the location of the haven. The group make their way there; along the way, Ruby and Liam begin to develop a romantic connection, but Ruby refuses to touch him, fearing that her powers will hurt him. At the haven, "Slip Kid" is revealed to be the president's son, Clancy Gray, who teaches Ruby on how to control her powers, and in turn, has Ruby teach him on how to erase people's memories.

Clancy, who is revealed to have the government working for him, calls in soldiers to round up the kids. He promised the kids and said that he wanted Ruby to himself. The soldiers arrived with reds who had just finished their time in Project Jamboree. While the soldiers start rounding up the kids Clancy attempts to rid Ruby of her negative memories and turn her to his side, but she manages to escape with the others. Liam flees with all of the camp members and Zu, while Ruby faces off against Clancy, ultimately destroying the camp, and making her escape with Chubs who is severely injured in the chaos. Liam reunites with Ruby and an unconscious Chubs in the woods, where Ruby uses her pendant to signal Cate for help.

Ruby and Liam are taken in by the League while Chubs is taken to a hospital to recover and Zu is reunited with her cousin. Ruby convinces Cate to release Liam, and have her take his place as a soldier. Knowing that Liam will never leave her, Ruby kisses him and erases all of his memories with her. Liam leaves the camp, while Ruby begins her training with her fellow League members as a weary Clancy raises an army of his own.