Edge of Tomorrow 3D, film review: 'At its worst, both repetitive and plain ridiculous'

Doug Liman, 113 mins, starring: Tom Cruise, Emily Blunt, Bill Paxton.

Tom Cruise in Doug Liman's Edge of Tomorrow (Warner Bros)

“All of humanity is at stake,” a pompous army General (Brendan Gleeson) warns the world early on in Doug Liman’s apocalyptic drama.

“You’re doomed!” is how another character sums matters up, Dad’s Army style.

Alien creatures called Mimics (and that look like oversized barnacles) have overrun most of the world. Plucky Britain is standing fairly firm against them and is the base for a D-Day style invasion of France to wipe them out for good.

This is where cowardly former ad man Major William Cage (Tom Cruise) enters the fray. On the battlefield, he is covered in Mimic blood and somehow ends up entering the enemy’s nervous system.

This enables him to re-live the same day again and again - until, together with a very muscular Emily Blunt (in G.I. Jane mould), he can finally work out how to save the world.

At its best, Edge Of Tomorrow has the same fatalistic humour that characterised Groundhog Day. At its worst, it is both repetitive and plain ridiculous.