RED PLANET (director: Antony Hoffman; screenwriters: Chuck Pfarrer/Jonathan Lemkin, from a story by Pfarrer; cinematographer: Peter Suschitzky; editors: Robert K. Lambert/Dallas S. Puett; cast: Val Kilmer (Gallagher), Carrie-Anne Moss (Bowman), Tom Sizemore (Burchenal), Benjamin Bratt (Santen), Simon Baker (Pettingil), Terence Stamp (Chantilas); Runtime: 106; Warner Bros.; 2000)
Reviewed by Dennis Schwartz
The third dull Hollywood film about Mars in a little over a year, after Tim Burton's "Mars Attacks!" and "Mission to Mars." I would think that three strikes and you're out should apply to any more of these space bombs cast into theaters by producers with big budgets and small stories. This one's a nuts-and- bolts sci-fier that looks good but its dialogue is just terrible, with the capable cast unable to overcome the poorly plotted story and saying things like Val Kilmer is forced to say about Mars, "Things happen on Mars that are extreme and otherworldly."
The story is a formula one, where the mission is to save the world and find missing algae needed to supply the world with oxygen. The characters are either undeveloped or predictable stock characters. The film itself is unconvincing, making the Mars-mission astronauts into a disharmonious team (which is hardly likely of ever happening, especially when this is known before the orbit, and the fact that it takes six months to reach their destination), and the unreality of the film is furthered by making one of them into a real villain, which seem far-fetched for an astronaut.
South African director Anthony Hoffman directs without imagination, as the film seems to drag on at a lethargic pace. The "Red Planet" was also void of humor and the obstacles encountered by the astronauts seemed arbitrarily thrown into the film to purposefully give the film an excuse for the special effects to be the star. I think Hollywood should reevaluate its plans to make these special effect only films about Mars and see if they can go back to the drawing board and put some life into these stories about the Earth's last frontier. Those B-movies made in the 1950s on a shoestring budget were more entertaining to me than this large-scale leaden sci-fi adventure story.
The film opens on the listless note it will maintain, unfortunately, throughout, as the serious Commander Bowman (Carrie-Anne Moss) will relate via her voiceover the purpose of the mission and introduce the crew, as she takes the viewer on a tour of the sleek aircraft.
In 2050, the Earth is about to become unlivable from pollution. The most telling sign of this danger, is that all the frogs have died. The only way the human race can save itself is the Mars Terraforming Project, an attempt by scientists to create a habitable atmosphere based on the obtaining of oxygen- producing blue-green algae, which calls for colonizing Mars. An unmanned Mars project that was working has mysteriously malfunctioned, so an emergency mission commanded by Bowman is sent to get things straightened out.
The introduction of the crew is done in the same tired formula style seen in countless films, as each member is labelled and doesn't move from that tag, except for the film's designated hero Gallagher (Val Kilmer), the ship's mechanical engineer, considered the least important person on the mission, a 'space janitor,' someone who has designs on Bowman, especially after seeing her beautiful tits when she comes out of the shower. Predictably, he becomes the most important member of the crew, saves the world and gets the only girl aboard the ship who isn't a mechanical robot.
The other crew members are so boring and one-dimensional, that when they started getting picked off one by one, for one reason or another, I was rooting for a more efficient way of getting rid of them, maybe picking up the pace at two at a time killings. Burchenal (Tom Sizemore) is the head scientist, he writes code for genetics and doesn't believe in God and jokes about becoming Mars's new "king" and having Bowman be the "queen" to propagate the species. His counterpart, wouldn't you know it, is a believer in God, the resident scientist-philosopher, Chantilas (Terence Stamp). He is an arrogant preacher of the truth, who's only purpose in the film, is to rant on about the limitations of science, seemingly impressed by the sound of his own voice. Thankfully we got rid of him in the first wave of deaths.
The two most repulsive crew members are the co-pilot, Santen (Benjamin Bratt), who is a tormentor of the others and an egomaniac, and the other is the agricultural specialist, Pettingill (Simon Baker), the villain, who is both a liar and a coward. This was some crew, lacking in credibility, wit and likability!
The voyage runs into trouble from a gamma ray storm, disabling some of its equipment. The Mars lander descends to the surface with Gallagher, Burchenal, Santen, Pettengil and Chantilas. We then get into the special effects part of the film, the only thing the film can brag about, as there's a well-photographed crash landing scene. The five men become the first humans on Mars when their landing capsule roughly bounces upon the desert surface until finally rolling to a stop, as they are surrounded by airbag-like balloons.
The barren red desert of Mars is breathtakingly beautiful, as the men trudge through it unable to find the algae that had been growing there. When they reach the spot that was created to house them safely for a two year period, they find it in ruins. The source of that destruction is a mystery, which the film never tries to explain. Did God do it? Maybe, an alien? It's an interesting theme, but this film was only able to grab onto its spectacular special effects (showing the Mars earth mysteriously moving) and by proving that there is life on Mars, and was not able to follow through on any ideas invested in the far-reaches of the story.
There is one other passenger on their voyage, an all-utility tracking robot, AMEE, who is maintained by Gallagher. When AMEE goes mustang and can't be repaired, she starts attacking the men, aiming to destroy all of the them by going into a war mode, which gives the story another contrived plot.
When ideas are quickly jettisoned, the film comes down to being a formula film, one of a rush against the clock to leave Mars in one piece, with Bowman, aboard the craft that is damaged by a solar flare, making emergency repairs and with the crew, now reduced to only the space janitor, trying to get back to the main craft and return to Earth with the knowledge to save humanity before it is too late.
I thought the film lacked suspense, and the acting was only bearable, not giving this film too much of a chance to overcome its overall dullness. If you are the kind of viewer who goes bananas for technology, this film might seem better to you than what I thought of it, as that part of the film was stunning, indeed. But if you are interested in a lively story, then I'm afraid you wouldn't get that on this mission.
REVIEWED ON 11/18/2000 GRADE: C
Dennis Schwartz: "Ozus' World Movie Reviews"
http://www.sover.net/~ozus
ozus@sover.net
© ALL RIGHTS RESERVED DENNIS SCHWARTZ
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews