Hey folks, Harry here... Remember that ol Doug McClure film, AT THE EARTH'S CORE? I do. As a child of the Seventies, I went to see that Burroughs film, and several others in the Doug McClure series and I had a great time. The special fx were hokey goofy fun even at that time. I knew that the upright running gigantic Boar monsters weren't real, but they were fun, imaginative and most of all dared me to imagine worlds at the center of the earth. As I've watched trailers for this movie get closer and closer, I just get giggly. You see, some studio spent tens upon tens upon dozens of millions of dollars to make a huge budget Doug McClure movie. My reaction, WHY THE HELL NOT? I'm up for that. Being a center of the earth fan from Jules Verne to Edgar Rice Burroughs to Mark Shaw... well, I just won't give up seeing this one no matter how bad folks say it is... I mean, I'll sit there as they travel hearing that Nordic voice screaming out, "Gerrrrrr Trrruuuuudeee!!!" at full volume... and a smile will cross my face. Having said all that, after my initial fun making of the trailer to this film, the screenwriter contacted me to tell me that all the science on this film about spinning molten core, plan for getting core spinning again... that's all absolutely scientificly sound... I SHIT YOU NOT! The Screenwriter is actually a physcist type... So while we may think it is silly stuff, apparently he claims it is accurate. Meanwhile, did you see my Ebay auction for that Bridge in Brooklyn? Well, check it out later, for now... BEWARE OF MASSIVE SPOILERS!!!
THE CORE brought me to tears. I'm not kidding. I left the theatre wiping my eyes dry. But not because it had a touching ending. No, these were tears of laughter. And so begins my review of THE CORE, the most hilariously rediculous, pathetic, cliched movie I've seen in a long time.
I laughed at the trailer. It promised "Armageddon" on earth. I didn't like "Armageddon" in space, so the same bad movie on earth didn't look too promising. It looked laughably bad in the trailer, but the movie itself turned out to be far funnier and rediculous than the trailer revealed.
This review contains spoilers, big smelly spoilers that will ruin the unintentional jokes for you. So if you want to sneak into this one when it comes out, and goof on it with your buddies, don't read any further.
THE CORE starts out with several signs that the earth isn't well. A shitload of people die because their pace-makers stop working, a flock of pidgeons go wacko because their radar isn't working right, and a space shuttle has a really bad re-entry into earth, so two scientists are called in to figure out what the fuck is happening. Generic white guy hero is one scientist, and annoying russian/french guy is the other.
The first 20 mins or so of the movie aren't bad at all. It's not until they start the hairbrained scheme to save the planet that the movie loses all credibility. The scientists tell the Washington suits that crazy shit is happening because the earth's core has stopped spinning, and that everyone on the planet will be dead in a year. Their only option is to dig to the core of the earth, and set off some NUKES, which naturally as anyone would expect, would jumpstart the core and it would start spinning again like normal. Sillyness. If the earth's core has completely stopped spinning, why are we even still alive?? Why would it take months to a year for us to be completely fucked?? It makes no sense... but moving on to dumber shit.
Bruce Willis's drilling crew was unavailable, so enter Delroy Lindo, another scientist. This guy invented a laser that can cut through rock & iron in seconds. Just what we needed to dig into the earth's thick rock and get to the core. But Delroy's magic laser will take 10 years to develop into a digging vehicle. However, slap a few billion dollars in his wallet, and it can be finished in 3 months!! Yes folks, it takes us years to launch shuttle missions, but when the earth is in trouble, we can design, construct, and test a laser drilling vehicle in 3 months flat. Load it up with a bunch of scientists and launch!
You have to see this vehicle in action to properly disbelieve it. Imagine a six-story tall rocket, with a flashlight at the tip. That's what this vehicle looked like. And it can laser blast it's way non-stop through the dense rock of the earth at HUNDREDS of miles an hour. This vehicle was doing something that the fucking Starship Enterprise couldn't do. For the entire second half of this movie, this miraculous vehicle is cutting through rock like it's jello. The hull of this thing is slammed numerous times at mach 50 but it's shell is fucking INVINCIBLE! This is such stupid movie as soon as they enter the mission, and it only gets worse. It's going to take them 36 hours to reach the core, and since this is a movie about people digging a deep hole, they had to write in some snags along the way.
On it's way down, the ship crashes into the Krypton set from Superman and gets stuck. Using a small laser, Delroy Lindo cuts through a crystal the size of a tree and frees up the crashed ship, but before they continue the journey, one of the crew members we don't care about dies from the old falling crystal into the skull trick. Boo hoo. One down, five to go.
Back on the surface, the atmosphere is all fucked up. A hole in the magnetic shield/ozone opens up, and burns the fuck out of the golden gate bridge melting it and all the people driving to work. Then in the funniest scene in the whole movie, a super lightning storm hits ROME, and we see a full-on ID4 wannabe scene, as the super lightning storm SHATTERS the Coliseum like glass!!! LIGHTNING STRIKES THE ROMAN COLISEUM AND IT EXPLODES like the white house in ID4!!! At this point I'm loving this movie so much. If the DVD has commentary I am buying it!
Back in the steaming hole, the captain (played by Hilary Swank, of "The Next Karate Kid" fame) decides to slam into some giant diamonds, causing the annoying russian scientist to get trapped in the last compartment of the ship, which detaches incase of such an event. So they eject his ass ,and boohoo, now we are down to 4.
Keerrrrasshh! Another ship fuckup. Time to send Delroy into a section of the ship, Spock style, where he has to hit a switch in 9,000 degree conditions. Too bad his suit can only withstand 4,500 degrees! Delroy hits the switch, but is cooked alive like a ballpark frank, but Swank opens up the airconditioning vent, so molten lava can cook him faster. That was her way of putting him out of his misery. How considerate.
Only 3 jackasses left on this ship.
Swank, a generic white guy hero dude, and the asshole 'Burke' type from Aliens, played by Stanley Tucci. Tucci is the douchebag that caused this whole mess. Apparently, he developed a weapon that zaps the earths core, causing earthquakes under enemy territories. Of course they zapped the core so much that it stopped spinning. Ooopsie! Time to file for unemployment. Tucci is actually really funny in this part. A slimy rat bastard, all the while a charming comic relief at the same time. But, you know he must die, and so the writers trap him in another section of the ship, and eject his ass with a nuke under his sack!
Alas, only Adam & Eve are left to save the planet. A Mr. douchebag Army General is on the surface with an itchy trigger finger ready to use the core zapping thing that started this whole mess to zap the core again. Hell, the first time they stopped the core with it, maybe they can zap it again and get it started again. MMmmmkay. Good thing the surface stays in constant communications with the ship, using the most incredible cellular network ever devised. It works thousands of miles under solid rock!
Anyway, Swank & co don't want them to zap them. They need to finish the mission as planned, but only with the help of a sickly computer nerd hacker that is working for the Army General. The sickly bastard is able to shutdown the dooms day zap device behind the General's back, giving our heroes the window they need to nuke the core, and stir the core's lava round and round, just like making a Dunken Hines cake mix! They have no power though. Hot damn! I know, let's use the molten lava around us as solar power! Let's rig the ship to run solar. It'll only take 5 mins! Great plan generic white hero dude!
They rig the ship, then start dropping nukes to get the cake mix going. Somehow, it took them 36 hours to get to the core, but it only takes 10 mins to travel in a complete circle around it.
The nukes are set off, but oh dear.. the ships lasers no longer work. The amazing laser that blasted the ship down to the core, can't help them get back up to the surface. Here is where the screenwriters really showed off their scary talent. The ship simply travels back up to the surface. No lasers, it just slides back up through rock and diamonds for 20 hours unexplained. Why explain it!? If the writers ignore it, maybe the audience will. Hell, they've established lightning can make the Roman Coliseum explode like it was full of gasoline tankers!
Sure enough, as Swank and the white hero cliche dude await their rescue pickup, they do a little tongue kissing. Something they should have been doing hours earlier when they thought they were going to die, but better late than never. After all, there's nothing like being awake for 57 hours stearing through molten rock that makes you want to kiss an unbathed stranger.
Now don't get me wrong. This isn't a bad movie. It's a piece of shit movie, a completely implausable, unoriginal turd that is great for laughs. Go see it !!!!! Jerry Bruckheimer laughs at this movie!
-Darth Siskel ending transmission-
