ALL SCI-FI

[orzel-w]

We don't seem to have a thread for this movie, so allow me to kick it off with a photo of me with Anubis (Carlos Lauchu, who portrayed him in the movie) at Comdex, Las Vegas, in 1994. We're checking out what there is to see in Vegas.


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...or not...

WayneO
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[Bud Brewster]

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Call me Johnny-on-the-spot, I have added this title to the Alphabetical Index thanks to Wayne, and I'm looking forward to what our members will have to say about it.

I haven't watched it in a while, and this has inspired me to download it, watch it right now, and craft a witty and informative review that's guaranteed to entertain one and all.

So . . . roll the film, please!



The team of Roland Emmerich and Dean Devlin have done some fine things together, but they're not real consistent. This movie falls right in between the best ones and the not-so-hot ones. When I first saw it, I think I was expecting too much — always the kiss of death, with guaranteed bad results.

But I have managed to re-watch movies I wasn't impressed with the first time and turn my opinion around. That's a good thing, because not liking a movie ain't a lick of fun.

As I remember, the first half sort of teased us with hints of great things to come . . . but the things that finally came weren't quite great enough.

Okay, that's what didn't happen. So, what did?

Well, when I watched a download of it tonight, I liked the interesting opening with strange happenings in ancient Africa (8,000 B.C.). Then we see archaeologist in 1930s Egypt, discovering a strange round thingamajig, which they raise up because if obviously looked so much cooler that way.

(Sorry, I just had a funny mental image of it falling over while the panicked workers ran screaming in terror.)



James Spader is just fine as the dedicated and unappreciated scientist who knows real important things that other scientists think are just funny as hell.

Kurt Russell is an Air Force colonel who looks so tough I suspect director Emmerich saluted him and said "Action, sir!" before each scene.



The rest of the cast is comprised of fine actors with familiar faces, but the only one I can name off the top of my head is Richard Kind, who played a funny political flunky in "Spin City" and now plays a corrupt politician in "Gotham". Not many actors could succeed in making us forget the former and love-to-hate the latter as well as he has.



I was a little put off by the way the mission through the stargate was handled. Rambo Russel and his well-armed assault team use the stargate to boldly go were no G.I.'s have gone before — fully equipped to shoot whatever they find and blow up the stargate with a bomb they brought with them.

This is not what a sci-fi lovin' space cadet like me wants to see. It's a little like test driving a Mercedes and running it off a cliff. On purpose.

Things get pretty slow for a while on the sandy alien world they arrive at, right up until James Spader feeds a candy bar to an alien camel-moose-thing, then spooks it and gets his foot caught in a dangling rope tied to the beast. He goes sand surfing across the dunes, while the music uses this slim excuse to run through the rousing theme.

But James being dragged by the shaggy critter actually works out better than one might expect, because the Stargate Troopers find a band of alien Arabs who bow down to them the minute they arrive.

Okay, now that is friendly.

But we're still waiting for something more like Star Wars and less like Lawrence of Arabia. Eventually something like that does happen, but a lot of patience is required.



On a positive note (just to stop being so negative), the plot certainly doesn't race along at a breakneck speed and get us all confused. Any members of the audience who dashed off to the snack bar during this part were quickly filled in about what they missed when they came back with $20.00 in snacks that should have costs $4.00.

The story finally gets more interest after the one hour mark, but not a whole lot more. And there's reams of dialog spoken in an ancient Earth language by the primitive people and the alien folk, but we never see a line of subtitles for all this. We just sit there wondering what all the jabbering is about while the actors emote like crazy.

It's frustrating.



The action-packed finale involves a lot of shooting and explosions when the brave men of Earth lead the sandy tribes of this Tatoonine wannabe in a revolt against the immortal boy/alien who wants do something really bad, although I can't quite remember what it was.



The sets, costumes, and props are actually pretty good. The alien soldiers' armor is clearly based on those black stone bird-head statues that were all the rage in Egypt long ago.







But alas, my attempt to change my middle-of-the-road opinion of this movie just ended up confirming it. It just doesn't have enough plot to fill a two hour movie, and even if they cut it down it wouldn't provide any really good moments.

That's the way it goes sometimes with Emmerich and Devlin.
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Krel.]

In the novel, the military were Marine Force Recon, not Air Force. Making them Marine Force Recon actually makes more sense.

The actor that played the boy/alien gave them headaches. They designed the costumes, and had him fitted, but when he showed up for filming, he had gotten nipple rings (something I never imagined I would EVER write) which he refused to have removed. The only answer they could come up with, was to put the chest plate on him.

The spaceship set was also a lot larger than you saw, they never filmed part of it.

Emmerich and Devlin were also upset when MGM did the tv series, they wanted to do a series of Stargate movies.

David.

[Robert (Butch) Day]

So far it has the only portrayal of the Larry Niven concept of a autodoc:



On September 5, 2013, during an interview with Digital Spy, Emmerich said that he and M-G-M are planning a new Stargate as a reboot with a trilogy.

On May 29, 2014, it was announced that M-G-M and Warner Bros. are partnering together for a reboot of Stargate as a trilogy with Emmerich directing, Devlin producing and Nicolas Wright & James A. Woods writing.
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Common Sense ISN'T Common

[Custer]

I've recently been tempted to buy the blu-ray of the Directors Cut Special Edition... well, it was only £2.99 (less than $5.00) including postage! So, you've given me an additional incentive to actually watch it again. 126 minutes, I see... not counting the "Making Of" documentary and various other special features.

[orzel-w]

[Bud Brewster]

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I discovered we had a 2nd thread for this movie (started by me by mistake), so I had to move Krel's comment to this one.
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[Maurice]

[Krel]

[Bud Brewster]

[Bogmeister]

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Here was the original film that spawned the long-running sf series which began in 1997.

It offers another way to travel through the galaxies different from the conventional way of starships (Star Trek, Star Wars, etc.) — instant transport via a gate, like teleportation.

James Spader is interesting as the sloppy, clumsy expert on deciphering old symbols, and Viveca Lindfors is also as another scientist/mother figure, but all the other characters, including lead Kurt Russell as the stoic military leader, are rather dull.

It's interesting that the TV version of Russell's character, as played by a wise-cracking Richard Dean Anderson, was very different.

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This was also the last big role for Jaye Davidson as the alien god figure; he was suitable for this but more such roles didn't pan out, it seems.

My main gripe, story-wise, is that there's a good build-up to find out what's on the other side of the gate, but what we find there is just not very interesting — unless you're really into any stories taking place in a desert. This was a moderate hit, but director Roland Emmerich and his writing partner really hit pay dirt next with the mega-hit Independence Day.

BoG's Score: 6 out of 10

_____________ Stargate (1994) Official Trailer


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BoG
Galaxy Overlord Galactus

[Bud Brewster]

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I watched this movie today in All Sci-Fi's Saturday Live Chat, and enjoyed it so much that I bought a "brand new" Blu-ray version on eBay for $24 (with free shipping), about half the price which Amazon is asking.
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[WadeVC]