# [film] "Lost In Space" A Postview, copyright p-m agapow 1998
That horribly smarmy Robinson family get (woah!) lost amid a veneer of plot, many special effects and minimal logic. Surprisingly enough, it's all quite fun.
In its never-ending search to drag more people to the movies, Hollywood has resurrected yet another old TV series for the nostalgia value. (I, for one, have zero fond memories of that rather dreadful series. Go and look at a few episodes sometime - it's singularly awful.) Wrapped up in muchos SFX, bankable stars and few surprises, one shouldn't hold much hope. But as cynical as the whole exercise is, "Lost in Space" is rather entertaining. It's mind-candy to be sure, but inoffensive mind-candy.
In some ways, the movie is quite faithful to the premise of the old series. In a future where the Earth is on the edge of ecological collapse and the technology for buttons has been lost, Professors Robinson (Hurt) and Robinson (Rogers) are taking a ship to a nearby star. There they will build a hypergate-type thingie to allow Earth people to pour through and despoil another planet. But the evil Sedition (evil largely for not being the Robinsons) wants to get there first and sics the rabid Dr Smith (Oldman) onto them. The Professors Robinson, their nuclear family and Smith don their many velcro'd and zippered uniforms and then get "lost in space".
The plot is garbage on most scientific and even logical levels. Given the profligate way the Robinsons live, I'm not surprised that the Earth is running out of resources. All that pollution seems to effect their brains, because they later forget that planets exert gravity. (It's amazing what the user manuals to spacecraft don't mention.) In many cringeworthy scenes, Dad Robinson is made to be ashamed that he spent too much time saving the Earth, and too little supervising young Will's crosstime experiments.
Most bizarre of all, they let the murderous Dr Smith loose on their ship. Now you know and I know and any sane person would know that if Gary Oldman stows away on your spaceship [presidential jet / apartment building / etc.], it is only a matter of time before he goes spastic with large quantities of automatic weapons and kills everyone. (Warning: should you ever be in this situation and Gary appears to be quiescent as he takes large quantities of drugs - this is no reason to relax. The drug-taking Gary is just a larval stage, and soon the ur-Oldman will emerge, go spastic with large quantities of automatic weapons and kill everyone. Do not let your guard down. Similar warnings are issued for John Malkovich, Steve Buscemi and Christopher Walken.)
But as said above, "Lost In Space" charms despite or perhaps because of its cliches. Dr Smith chews much scenery and snarls out cutting one-liners. (At first the filmmakers keep him relatively under control, but by the end of the picture just stand back shouting, "Look out, he's gonna blow!".) Matt LeBlanc, who plays a dumb, over-sexed lug on "Friends", here plays pilot Don West as a dumb, over-sexed lug. As a consequence, he is involved in by-the-numbers sexual tension with the eldest Robinson daughter and some nice space fight scenes (in very cute fighters adapted to 3D combat). Penny Robinson makes an entertaining, angst-ridden teenager who keeps a very funny half confessional / half fantasy video diary. Will pals around amusingly with the robot. William Hurt - who has build an acting career of looking vaguely disconcerted by everything - be it castration, devolution into primordial energy or imprisonment in a Latin American jail - looks appropriately agonised by every little decision. Only Judy and Professor Mom Robinson come across as a little dull, although they are at least competent, a thankful point of divergence with the original. Slap in some glossy SFX, big explosions, a groovy set of end credits and you get nicely entertained for your 10 bucks. At times the movie does slow down, chiefly where they insist on pursuing the plot or blabbering about Big Issues and the Importance of Family, but these occasions are mercifully brief.
Do we need another brash, big and meaningless picture? Maybe not. But in a balanced diet of entertainment and edification, "Lost in Space" makes a worthy entry on the entertainment side. [***] and lemonade on the Sid and Nancy scale.
"Lost In Space"
Released 1998.
Directed by Stephen Hopkins.
Starring William Hurt, Gary Oldman, Heather Graham, Mimi Rogers, Matt
LeBlanc, Lacey Chabert, Jack Johnson.
-- paul-michael agapow (agapow@computer.org), La Trobe Uni, Infocalypse "There is no adventure, there is no romance, there is only trouble and desire."
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