Pandorum review
-
Pandorum
Overture Films
R 108 min
Oh no!!! Despite energy taxes, windmills, recycled toilet paper and the Kyoto accord, Earth’s population has exploded to the point that what’s left of the air water and food isn’t nearly enough to stave off the destruction of mankind!
The good news is that there’s a planet a lot like earth we can move to. Hooray. , However, the bad news is that it’s a kajillion light years away and the journey to get there could be longer than the wait to see the Browns in a Superbowl.
Anyway we pack as many willing travelers as possible into vacuum sealed canisters, not unlike those Twilight Zone gold thieves used, and bid the people of Earth bon voyage.
So that’s what happened before PANDORUM begins.
Here’s the part someone mistook for a movie plot.
Two men, Bower and Peyton (Ben Foster and Dennis Quaid) awaken from the extended slumber with almost no idea what’s going on. As memory slowly comes back it seems that this ship, loaded with what’s left of the race is about to stop working.
That is, of course, unless Bower can make his way to the bridge and flips the emergency switch.
Not only is the bridge all the way over on the other side of the Cuyahoga, but also it seems that many of the passengers have bad reactions to genetic treatment meant to help them adapt to the long ride. Worse than carsickness or even diarrhea they’ve turned into space zombies!!! Don’t you just hate space zombies?
Now Bowers and a ragtag band of survivors plod along a torturous trek toward the bridge that seems to take almost as long as the 800-year journey through space.
So what the hell is “PANDORUM” you may ask?
Well, it’s some kind of delirium that causes some people on extended galactic voyages to hallucinate. What that means in this case is that you know somebody on board is as crazy as a space ship-house rat and there’s a good chance that nothing is as it seems. In the immortal words of Dr. “Happy” Harry Cox, “Your brain may not be the boss!”
My first misgiving about PANDORUM is in the opening scene in which you’re asked to believe that though technology is to the point of sending a ship across the universe that the crew still uses green Halloween glow sticks for light.
But then the boredom sets in. as we switch back and forth from Bower trudging through the grimy industrial space hulk and Peyton manning the intercom like the Verizon guy, “can you hear me now?”
This claustrophobic and listless rip off of ALIEN (which I didn’t like either) made me envy the passengers who were lucky enough to sleep through the whole mess.
D
WSS
Hello! It looks like you're interested in this conversation, but you don't have an account yet.
Getting fed up of having to scroll through the same posts each visit? When you register for an account, you'll always come back to exactly where you were before, and choose to be notified of new replies (either via email, or push notification). You'll also be able to save bookmarks and upvote posts to show your appreciation to other community members.
With your input, this post could be even better 💗
Register Login