Well Geeks, AICN very own Quint saw MISSION TO MARS and disagrees with the bulk of reviews that have come in to Geek Headquarters the last couple of days, maybe I should have gone after all...
Ahoy Father Geek... Chief... ladies and gentlemen. Everybody's favorite crusty seaman back once more, this time with yet another look of Mission To Mars.
Going into the flick last night I didn't expect to review it. I had seen all the reports on various screenings of the film up on the site and I figured it'd be too much to add yet another. But, after seeing the movie and actually reading the most recent reviews I felt compelled to write something up for you, Constant Readers. To give some of you hope.
I actually liked this movie quite a bit. It'll unfortunately get burned a lot with comparisons to it's visual counterpart, 2001, a vastly superior film. But I'm getting a little ahead of myself.
A little more than a year ago, I had stumbled across a script at the main camp site in the Episode 1 line. As I recall, Harry and Father Geek were still sleeping the late night away in their tent and I was bored silly. Harry had brought along "reading material" which equaled a nice sized stack of scripts. The top one caught my eye, not because of the name of the movie, but of the writer. It was Mission To Mars by Ted Tally. Ted Tally, for those who don't know, was the man who was able to craft one of the best book to screen adaptations in recent years with Silence of the Lambs. So, being the sneaky, crusty seaman that I am, I dug into the script.
I have been eager to see the movie ever since. The script had it's problems, but I was sure the draft I read was a very early one. The dialogue was off, in desperate need of a rewrite, some of the situations didn't work, but it was a fun premise with some very unexpected twists and turns. Given a little time and a snip here or there and it'd be ready to knock audiences down with pure coolness.
Flashforward to last night, I was sitting in the Metropolitan theater (which oddly enough was the same theater we were camping out at where I first read the script) awaiting the glorious eye-candy.
The movie starts off like very few seem to nowadays... setting up characters. I think a lot of people are going to be turned off by the fact that this movie spends time with its characters, develops them, at least tries to make them into real people. I love it when a movie can successfully do that. Look at Jaws, for example. It takes its time with its characters, so when they are put into a dangerous situation, you actually care and are rooting for them to win, not the shark, unlike the fun slasher flicks of the '80s where you end up rooting for the Freddy or Jason.
The problem with Mission to Mars is it never really got what was wrong in the script righted before shooting. Some of the dialogue still seems very forced. The writers felt compelled to tell the audience instead of show us. That and the fact that it had a bad score were the two things that kept me from loving this film. I had no problem with the character moments, like when Tim Robbins and wife dance in zero gravity. You have to care for these people if you're going to feel anything when they are put in danger. I love those extra scenes of moments between people that give the characters flesh.
One of my favorite scenes and the one I think the audiences are going to walk away with the most is a scene in which the crew must abandon ship (not to mention the awesome way the ship is damaged enough to need abandoning) and are just floating out in space. I'm not going to give away anything, but that whole scene is amazing.
Based on what I witnessed last night and what I've been reading on the site today, this movie is going to split the audiences in two. Last night when the movie ended about 40% of the audience clapped and cheered and about 40% booed and hissed. The rest of the audience remained silent. There were a few walkouts, also. After the movie, as I was walking past groups of people talking about the movie, I heard everything from "That movie rocked!" to "That was the worst movie I have ever seen!"
Which side will you be on? I have no idea. I hope you like it, because afterall, that's what movies are there for. The only thing I can say for sure is that I liked it. I expect to hear shit about it in talkback, but it's my honest opinion. I urge you to see it, like I do for every movie that comes out, for you shouldn't take somebody else's word for it.
That about wraps it up for me. I'll leave with a word on one of the trailers which was played before the movie, the second Dinosaur trailer. With the noticeable exception of the "love monkey" line, which has put up a red "Caution" flag in my mind, it looks amazing. I can't wait.
Farewell and adieu you fair geeky readers....
-Quint
aicnquint@aol.com
