The Maze Power Walker

 What happens when you combine the casts of Game Of Thrones, Teen Wolf, and We're The Millers? You get a group of boys trying to figure out why they are in the middle of a maze that changes nightly. That is the Maze Runner. Based off a popular teen novel and now getting the movie treatment like Divergent and The Hunger Games. Adapting teen novels is becoming as popular a movie trend as comic books. In this case, Maze Runner is ahead of the pack in some cases, but it does get a little complex. Complexity works with this one. 

Thomas (Dylan O'Brien) wakes up in an elevator and is deposited into a strange campsite type community of other boys. He's got no memory and no idea what he is doing there. He meets the rest of the group and learns that they are surviving by a set of rules. After he learns they are trapped in a maze, he begins to violate the rules in the hopes of finding a way out of their "prison." He quickly develops a rivalry with Gally (Will Poulter) and when Theresa (Kaya Scodelario) shows up the group begins to divide. Thomas believes that if they don't find away through the maze, they will all die.  

  

 The beauty of the story comes in the fact that you are as confused as Thomas is. It takes some time to figure out what is going on and that is almost the fun of it. It has several "Lord of The Flies," influences and a few that seem to borrow from ,"Divergent." Marrying these concepts work well and the film really only has a couple of flaws. The camera work during the fight scenes make it really hard to figure out what is going on. The monsters look cool , but the scenes are really busy and hard to follow. There are also a few things left unexplained and I am sure they are discussed in the book. The one issue with books being adapted is things being cut for pacing. Things get removed, but pieces are left on screen and the audience gets confused. 

  I liked the cast a lot and Dylan O'Brien is a future star beyond this and Teen Wolf. I thought it was cool that Will Poulter stretched beyond comedy, but after We're The Millers, I kept waiting for him to start singing TLC'S "Waterfalls." The movie is pretty good and like it or not, a sequel has already been green lit. I am not sure it will see the success of The Hunger Games, but it runs ahead of some of the bad movies that were released in the summer of 2014.