Reviews

First of all, I have no idea why this thing is in this database at all.

Why?

This is an Internet MOVIE Database, is it not?

Let's, then, define what a movie is. It's something that involves characters acting out a plot, right? Well, this has neither.

Characters? They're flat and simple. Everyone's so predictable and dumb that I find it really hard to call them "characters" at all.

Plot? Like I said, what plot? Okay, a big earthquake severs California off the rest of the American continent. That's fine. Now let's roll a die and pick from a Big List O' Ideas. Bad Ideas. Hey, dammit, it's only an earthquake, so: (1) why do mutations spread within days? (2) why does all the visible world turn to a desert, and all the world's population seems to have died out? (3) why is all communication disrupted and no large-scale military search-and-rescue operations? (4) why is the Earth's axis shifted?? now ask any physicist why an earthquake can't cause that. (5) why are the world's waters toxic all of a sudden? ... must I go on? The screenplay writer was apparently in the middle of a huge writer's block, and he went to talk to someone, whom he asked: "what should I make the plot revolve around? Mutants? Toxicity? Natural catastrophies? World anarchy? Planetary disasters?" His conversation partner must've, jokingly, answered, "all of it". And the screenplay dude took that seriously. Ouch.

Okay, I've seen many Dolph Lundgren movies, they were mostly B movies, but fun and relaxing B movies. I watched this one, hoping it to be another. And I ended up hacking my way through completely nonsensical plot and dialogues so corny that I laughed through most of the most "serious" scenes. So much for pathos.

This is Mad Max without the kick-ass characters and plot. This is Volcano with aliens coming out from the lava. This is Armageddon with a big green lump of toxic space moss instead of the asteroid. This is Waterworld with a giant squid monster and no dry land plot, and Costner turning out to be an Allah's prophet.

Stay away. Stay very far away. Watching the news for the fifth time might prove more entertaining. 1/10.

Reading the reviews of this movie, I cannot help but recall a short comedy clip which I saw somewhere. It featured a modern art gallery, full of well-dressed high-class people, walking around and commenting on various wacky paintings, until the camera pans over to several elderly men surrounding another example of art on another wall. They point at it, comment how surrealistic it is, how the author managed to capture this and that, how perfect and how brilliant it is - until the "painting" begins moving, and drives off, it being just a piece of a soft drink advert pinned to the side of a truck that was parked outside a gallery window.

"Deliberately slow-paced"? I don't mind slow-paced movies, not at all, but watching minute after minute of slow walking and talking about nothing in particular while the important issues remain completely unmentioned, is a bit too much. "Brilliant in its meaning"? _What_ meaning, excuse me? I cannot find any possible interesting explanation of its ending, really - the only two meanings I can see is one horribly shallow, cheap sappy excuse for a romantic sacrifice dressed in an old "meaning of humanity" robe, or a big twist beyond any possible reasoning. The former being surprisingly more likely.

** SPOILERS ** - my quick overview of what, in my opinion, went wrong in the movie.

First of all, who in their right mind sends a single civilian to a space station, when previously a military task force failed in there?

Next, suppose your deceased beloved one materializes next to you. Would your first impulse be to chat a bit and then simply kill that person again (as they're not real anyway), then watch them reappear, and then become emotionally attached to them again? Sounds weird, doesn't it? But that's what Clooney does in there.

This only gets worse in the ending. Clooney sees a vision of his own "clone" (cloone?:) on Earth, and decides to stay on the crash-coursed station. Why? For the sake of his dead wife that wasn't even there? Come on. But if it is so, what does this "Clooney-clone on Earth" stuff mean? It just doesn't make sense at all. The only thing that comes to my mind is "we are all clones created by someone", but I refuse to believe in such a banal idea, which actually doesn't fit in that moment anyway.

** END OF SPOILERS **

So what point the movie is trying to make, remains a mystery to me. "We live only for the ones we love, even when they're dead"? Please. "We only exist when someone remembers us"? Not explored enough. "Everything is just an illusion"?? Puh-leeease...!!

In a nutshell, the biggest problem with this movie was its pride. It presents itself like a piece of deep, meaningful art, giving time to think, to absorb, to conclude... but there is nothing to think of. The message is shallow and undecided, jumping from Harlequin romance to weary existence questions, like a hamburger served on a silver plate. There is nothing new in this movie, except exceptional boredom. It failed as a "cerebral movie", it failed as a SF, it failed as a romance. I'm sorry, but it is simply a bad movie defended only by an old "you don't like it because you don't understand it!" line. Yeah, been there, done that. 2/10.

Okay. The movie is based on a good idea - dragons in the futuristic world - that is something original. Still, it was the end of the ideas for this movie - the rest of the plot is a typical "kill the big baddie" movie: the heroes come in, they get their butts kicked, then the last remaining heroes go and valiantly kick the butt of the big baddie in return. Usually it's some mafia boss or a big bad alien, and this time it's a dragon. The movie is like a mixture between "Jurassic Park" and "Mad Max", just it lacks some suspense in the tense moments.

There are some plotholes, and even a lot of them, but they are not very disturbing (well, except one - *spoiler* what happened to the rest of the female dragons? Did they starve? *end of spoiler*).

Overall, the movie was not bad. But I'd rather watch it on TV, without paying for it. Still, I don't feel cheated in any way. The movie promised dragons, flames and typical action, and it gave it all. I just expected more... spirit, I guess, as it was boring sometimes. It's ok in its own category though. I'll give it 5 of 10. It's somewhat much in terms of its plot, but the movie didn't promise to be something it was not and the dragon designs were well done.

After seeing the trailer, and finding out that it's a movie by the same guy that made the great "6th Sense", I expected an equally great movie, full of suspense and surprises, thrilling and scary. Hey, that's the impression the trailer left me with: people running and screaming, boarding up the house, stalked by someone, flashlights flickering and strange signs in the crops... A perfect thriller, I thought!

I couldn't be more wrong, it seems. The movie is NOTHING like the thriller. In fact, the thriller covers more or less the first half of the movie... The only half that is somewhat interesting. No spoilers here, really: the trailer reveals that it is a movie about (probably) aliens making strange markings in the fields, and stalking people, who run away screaming. And yes, that's what the first half is... but then it only gets worse.

All the suspense is lost, and the whole "what are the aliens, if it's aliens, up to?" affair is turned into a big pro-religious pile of moral issues. The main hero is an ex-priest, and the whole second half of the movie is about how he realizes that what happens around him cannot possibly be a pure concidence, and that perhaps he should return to the faith. AND THAT'S IT! The aliens cease to be important anymore; the mystery is gone, the suspense is gone, and the whole danger disappears within the last moments of the movie. The only thing that remains important is how the ex-priest questions his faith (or non-faith). Why put aliens in there? Why the cropsigns?? Okay, so he lost his wife in a car accident - this isn't much of a spoiler, it's shown in the first 10 minutes of the movie. So he lost his faith when she died, okay, a nice movie beginning. So something happens that makes him rethink his views... But why market it as a mystery thriller with aliens in it!?

In a nutshell: - plotholes big enough for the starship Enterprise to fly through. - storyline... WHAT storyline? Summarizeable in two-three sentences. And left completely unexplained (or very badly explained, for that matter). - religious messages cheap and cheesy. Good religious doubts were in "End of Days", in "Stigmata", NOT in here at all! Here, religion=good, atheism=bad, plain and simple. - acting... not bad, but only Gibson matters, the other actors are just in the background, far far away.

*** BIG SPOILER : the movie summarized! ***

First, we have strange cropsigns, all over the world, and radio appliances emit strange noises. Enter the aliens: they come in ships and hover over cities. Part three, aliens come to hunt people, Gibson with his family hides in the basement. Part four, the invasion is aborted and the aliens leave, defeated with... water. So Gibson fights one horrifyingly stupid alien and returns to being a priest, deciding that it's all a sign from God, more or less. END OF MOVIE.

*** Spoilers end ***

I think I'm going to re-watch "The Return of the Living Dead 2" tonight, for a change. Crap, low-budget and b-class, but better effects, better acting, less plotholes. Sadly.

If you want a really good and frightening movie with a message by this director, return to the "Sixth Sense".

***SPOILERS*** ***SPOILERS*** The movie had as much sexual tension as a dead frog on a highway. Actually, all the "sex" scenes made me laugh, especially with Loreena McKennitt's beautiful and rich musical scores and vocals played as the background for what must've been the cheesiest and most "tried to be ambitious but failed miserably" scenes I've ever seen. After the one when the main heroine withdraws from the encounter with another guy, and rushes home, I really expected her to reach out and turn a stereo off, or something. The whole action stops, and still the music continues till the scene is changed?? How cheap is that?? And this "Mystic Dream" song was way abused throughout the movie, appearing in every single intercourse scene (I can't bring myself to call it "sex", sorry!).

SPOILERS AHEAD, be warned.

Apart from the music, though, the characters were simply... dumb. A policeman sees a woman being literally run over by a car and runs to check if she is alive, instead of just telling someone to call an ambulance and starting the chase immediately, forgetting the basic police rule "NEVER EVER start a chase without calling for backup"?? He chases the black Thunderbird through a Chinatown parade, gets his windows knocked out and stuff, instead of just getting out of the car and running on foot which would've been way faster in that case?? Didn't he have a roof-mounted signal light or something, like most police cars do?? Earlier on, he has to do a full zoom on Jade's face on the tape, to recognize her? Come on, I saw it was her minutes before that! I re-watched this scene several times, certain that he must be looking for some tattoo, or something, to have to look this close at her face...

EVEN WORSE SPOILER to the very movie ending!!

In the end, it all comes to... nothing! The cause for all the killing was the governor's affair with Jade. So the overzealous policemen are killed, but the governor stays alive and well, and the main hero can do nothing to him... Great going, all for naught, evil still walks the Earth. Together with the woman's husband being yet another killer, and her still being trapped in a very uncomfortable marital situation. I understand bad endings all right, but there was no REASON for this here. It all just... happened. I wouldn't be surprised if in the end the main hero shot himself in the head, all of a sudden, just like that. Who needs logical reasons anyway?..

Generally, the movie was dump and cheesy. 3 out of 10.