WING COMMANDER
A movie review by Joe Barlow
(c) Copyright 1999
STARRING: Freddie Prinze Jr., Matthew Lillard, David Warner, Ginny Holder, Tche'ky Karyo, Saffron Burrows DIRECTOR: Chris Roberts WRITER: Kevin Droney (based on the computer game) RATED: PG-13 RELEASED: 1999
RATING: ** (out of a possible ****)
Few computer games have ascended to the rank of "cultural icon," but "Wing Commander" is one that has. Released by Origin Systems almost a decade ago (yes, it really has been that long), the game, a self-professed "space combat flight simulator," featured state-of-the-art graphics, terrific replay value, and frantic (not to mention addictive!) arcade action. I was one of the many who got hooked, rushing home after work each day so I could resume my quest to save the universe from the evil Kilrathi. "Wing Commander" (and eventually "Wing Commander II") dominated my life for several months; I gained proficiency in blowing up alien spacecraft even as my social calendar evaporated before my uncaring eyes.
But all things must pass, and eventually the game was replaced by newer challenges on my hard drive. At least four sequels (and possibly more) have appeared since the glory days of "Wing Commander II" ("Wing Commander III," "Wing Commander IV," "Wing Commander Academy," and "Wing Commander: Privateer"), but I never played any of them. Indeed, I rarely play video games at all these days: I spend most of my life working in front of computers, and the last thing I want to do is spend even more time in front of one for relaxation purposes. But I've nonetheless retained an affection for the games of by-gone years, and when I heard that a big-screen adaptation of "Wing Commander" was headed for theaters, I was delighted.
The plot of 20th Century Fox's movie follows that of Origin's computer game fairly closely: it's 500 years in the future, and Earth is at war with a fierce alien race called the Kilrathi, who in the game looked like big tigers, but here resemble nothing so much as Hans Moleman's head grafted onto Arnold Schwarzenegger's body. The Kilrathi have stolen a device called a NavCom from an Earth-owned asteroid base, and this is bad news indeed for our planet: the NavCom will allow the Kilrathi to discover the jump coordinates they need to bombard our homeworld.
A group of hot young space pilots may be the only thing that can stop the attack. Operating from a battered starship called the Tiger's Claw, this group, headed by Jeanette "Angel" Devereaux (Saffron Burrows), their wing commander, is determined to do anything they can to thwart the aliens' plan. The fighters include Chris Blair (Freddie Prinze Jr.), who lives with discrimi- nation every day of his life; the aptly-named Todd "Maniac" Marshall (Matthew Lillard), who's an overconfident show-off but an excellent pilot; and Rosie Forbes (Ginny Holder), a young black woman eager to prove that Maniac isn't the only daredevil on the ship.
"Wing Commander's" opening credits are spectacular, mixing audio clips from famous space-related speeches (Kennedy's vow to put a man on the moon by the end of the '60s, etc.) with a visual montage of star-charts and nebulas. As the credits continue, other fictitious but real-sounding news bulletins are heard, such as the first broadcast from the Mars colony, the declaration of war on the Kilrathi, etc. I loved the effect; it got me interested in the story right away, lending a sense of historical weight to the events even though they're fictional.
Unfortunately, it's also the extent of the movie's cleverness. For the rest of its duration, "Wing Commander" runs strictly on auto- pilot, giving us a bunch of largely interchangeable characters who fly around in spaceships and shoot things. (Imagine how the Death Star battle in "Star Wars" would've been if Luke Skywalker had called in sick that day.) The movie never even bothers to tell us why we're at war with the Kilrathi-- merely because they're there, I expect. (In all fairness, the game was equally vague on this point.) This was one of the big disappointments from me: I was hoping to get a better glimpse at the culture of a formidable space foe, but the movie paints them as targets, not adversaries.
"Wing Commander" flings exposition at the audience as though we were in elementary school. Lacking any creative way to integrate information seamlessly into the story, the film has the characters speak at great length about things they should already know. An example: early in the film, some of our key characters find them- selves being drawn towards what appears to be black hole. As they work frantically to free themselves, someone asks what will happen if they are unable to break free. The reply: "We're all gonna be sucked into space, one molecule at a time." Shouldn't a crew of veteran space explorers already know this sort of thing? Should they waste valuable time talking about it?
But that's tame compared to the movie's biggest blunder. The Blair character is descended from a race called The Pilgrims, who are despised and mistrusted by every other race. In a laughable scene, Blair visits his captain to ask why everyone despises his heritage. The captain, bless his heart, then proceeds to explain the history of Blair's own race to him! This would be comparable to a black man going up to a white man during the '50s and asking why those guys in the white hoods and robes are mean to him! ("Well, Billy, a long time ago there was a thing called slavery...") I burst into muffled laughter at the thought that the Blair character wouldn't know the history of his own race, when apparently EVERY OTHER CHARACTER IN THE MOVIE is well aware of it. You'll be pleased to know that I successful restrained an urge to hurl popcorn at the screen.
Character interaction is handled with as little dialogue as possible, causing many of the protagonists to come across as nothing more than walking plot points. Commander Gerald (Jurgen Prochnow), for example, makes an anti-Pilgrim slur in virtually every single line of his dialogue. Every time he appeared on the screen, the movie basically halted for a moment while Gerald spewed forth a flood of racist comments. Angel, so interesting in the computer game, never really feels real here: I didn't buy the way she handled a particular crisis late in the film involving Maniac, nor did I appreciate the formulaic relationship between her and Blair, which certainly didn't exist in the game and feels tacked on here, possibly as a result of a market study which indicated that the film needed another love story. Matthew Lillard's portrayal of Maniac is a bright point, however: Lillard has played lunatics in three films now ("Scream" and "She's All That" are the other two); he's comfortable depicting psychopaths, and is getting better with practice. I liked his interactions with the Rosie character: their constant "I'm better than you are" competitions are amusing and oddly sweet, culminating in the film's best bit of dialogue:
ROSIE: "You've got balls."
MANIAC: "You should seem 'em."
ROSIE: "Mine are bigger."
MANIAC: "I've been told size doesn't matter."
ROSIE: "She lied."
The movie isn't consistently entertaining, but it has a pulse. Largely hollow characters and a frequently disappointing script are somewhat balanced by the movie's visual effects (the combat scenes actually feel more like ballet than typical action sequences). Parts of the film are undeniably fun, but overall, "Wing Commander" is rather like watching someone else play your favorite video game for two hours-- you keep wishing they'd leave, so you could have a turn.
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