**SPOILERS**There are so many other negative comments about this movie that I can't believe I'm writing this. But it was SO bad that I just gave Red Planet my first "1" rating on IMDb. That by itself led me to write this. I wasn't expecting much at all - and I was STILL disappointed. I thought that a sci-fi film with Val Kilmer and Carrie-Anne Moss couldn't be all bad, despite what I'd heard. Ha! It insults the viewer. I try not to nit-pick movies, but when the errors JUMP out at you for the entire movie, it's unforgivable. Even Mission to Mars was better.
Some of the visual effects were adequate, but overall this movie fails miserably. The premise was weak, the plot was cliched, the script was dull, the acting was poor, and the physics/science was WAY off throughout. About the best part of the movie was the gratuitous Carrie-Anne Moss shower scene. But it's really not worth watching just for that.
I disliked this film from the start. A decent movie at least needs a good premise. I stopped the tape 5 times in the first 5 minutes so I could rail against the totally lame, error-filled, and illogical premise of Red Planet.
Supposedly, by the year 2000, humanity is starting to realize we've so polluted the Earth that the only alternative for humanity is simply to "find a new home." So we began a 20-year program of algae seeding on Mars, to create a breathable atmosphere. But something goes wrong, and the algae are suddenly dying. Our heroes will have to go to Mars to figure out why, and save humanity. It's only sci-fi, and they need some reason to go to Mars, but this premise bites. The dates/years don't add up, and there are several other obvious holes and lame assumptions too. Any moron should realize that it would be a million times harder to terraform and colonize an entire plant (in the very near future no less) than it would be to just fix the environmental problems we've created here on Earth.
I thought the movie might still be worth watching, despite the weak start. Nope. They just threw in every cliche and hackneyed plot device they could dredge up from other movies, and tried to make it work. But they didn't put enough passion, effort, or plot twists into any of it, and an awful mess was the result. There was NO suspense; NO surprises. I knew what would happen in almost every scene. I never cared enough about the characters to even really sympathize much with their predicament either.
******** SPOILERS ********
OF COURSE, as the mission nears Mars, a huge "solar flare" virtually cripples their ship, to the point the crew must abandon it. One person (Moss) must stay behind and manually initiate the escape sequence for the others. They have to jettison their invaluable navigation robot on the way down, but it only gets slightly damaged on impact. By the way, it just happens to look like a giant feline terminator, has a combat mode that it gets locked into when the crew, to their detriment, tries to deactivate it later.
OF COURSE, the lander module crash-lands, but the crew somehow survives, and manages to crash very near the (previously constructed) Mars habitat, which contains food and oxygen. But when the crew reaches the habitat, it's been destroyed. In orbit, Carrie-Anne manages to repair the ship enough to return to Earth. She assumes the crew is dead. But they manage to make contact JUST IN TIME, via a 50-year-old modem no less, that was conveniently located nearby in some old abandoned equipment. Right! (Similar to the improbable upload of the virus into the alien computer system in Independence Day.)
OF COURSE, they discover, as they are running out of air, that they can somehow breathe fine on good ol' Mars after all. LOL. But it doesn't really matter, because they have no way to get off the planet anyway. EXCEPT for the old Russian probe that failed to return to Earth 50 years before. It just HAPPENS to be nearby too. Wow, it's a small world after all! But there won't be room in it for everyone, so one person will have to stay behind. But we know that their nav robot-turned-killer will make that problem moot, unless the nasty Mars bugs eat them first. (Can anyone say, The Mummy?) Turns out the bugs ate all of the algae from the terraforming project, and produce oxygen themselves, which is why the crew can breathe. That doesn't even come close to accounting for the temperature and pressure changes, etc., that would be necessary for humans to breathe unaided on Mars. But Hollywood thinks we're all MORONS, right?
OF COURSE, then Kilmer (sole survivor) can't get off Mars after all, because the Russian batteries have died. In one of the few mildly interesting scenes, Moss talks to Kilmer when it seems he must surely be left to die. Can you say The Abyss? (Although far less moving.) As Moss prepares to leave, Kilmer realizes he can use the robot's battery to power the probe's launch, if he can get its battery while it's trying to kill him. He does just that, with NO problem, and launches the probe, into JUST the right orbit to rendezvous with the main ship, JUST in time!
OF COURSE, Moss must go EVA and snag Kilmer with a tether, and once inside she must perform CPR to save him. (The Abyss again!) At least Val brought a couple of bugs with him, to take back to Earth to be analyzed. Yippee, he's a hero! OF COURSE, nothing is really answered - there are tons of loose ends.
My description almost makes the movie sound like it could be mildly entertaining. Sorry. It isn't. 1/10.
Some of the visual effects were adequate, but overall this movie fails miserably. The premise was weak, the plot was cliched, the script was dull, the acting was poor, and the physics/science was WAY off throughout. About the best part of the movie was the gratuitous Carrie-Anne Moss shower scene. But it's really not worth watching just for that.
I disliked this film from the start. A decent movie at least needs a good premise. I stopped the tape 5 times in the first 5 minutes so I could rail against the totally lame, error-filled, and illogical premise of Red Planet.
Supposedly, by the year 2000, humanity is starting to realize we've so polluted the Earth that the only alternative for humanity is simply to "find a new home." So we began a 20-year program of algae seeding on Mars, to create a breathable atmosphere. But something goes wrong, and the algae are suddenly dying. Our heroes will have to go to Mars to figure out why, and save humanity. It's only sci-fi, and they need some reason to go to Mars, but this premise bites. The dates/years don't add up, and there are several other obvious holes and lame assumptions too. Any moron should realize that it would be a million times harder to terraform and colonize an entire plant (in the very near future no less) than it would be to just fix the environmental problems we've created here on Earth.
I thought the movie might still be worth watching, despite the weak start. Nope. They just threw in every cliche and hackneyed plot device they could dredge up from other movies, and tried to make it work. But they didn't put enough passion, effort, or plot twists into any of it, and an awful mess was the result. There was NO suspense; NO surprises. I knew what would happen in almost every scene. I never cared enough about the characters to even really sympathize much with their predicament either.
******** SPOILERS ********
OF COURSE, as the mission nears Mars, a huge "solar flare" virtually cripples their ship, to the point the crew must abandon it. One person (Moss) must stay behind and manually initiate the escape sequence for the others. They have to jettison their invaluable navigation robot on the way down, but it only gets slightly damaged on impact. By the way, it just happens to look like a giant feline terminator, has a combat mode that it gets locked into when the crew, to their detriment, tries to deactivate it later.
OF COURSE, the lander module crash-lands, but the crew somehow survives, and manages to crash very near the (previously constructed) Mars habitat, which contains food and oxygen. But when the crew reaches the habitat, it's been destroyed. In orbit, Carrie-Anne manages to repair the ship enough to return to Earth. She assumes the crew is dead. But they manage to make contact JUST IN TIME, via a 50-year-old modem no less, that was conveniently located nearby in some old abandoned equipment. Right! (Similar to the improbable upload of the virus into the alien computer system in Independence Day.)
OF COURSE, they discover, as they are running out of air, that they can somehow breathe fine on good ol' Mars after all. LOL. But it doesn't really matter, because they have no way to get off the planet anyway. EXCEPT for the old Russian probe that failed to return to Earth 50 years before. It just HAPPENS to be nearby too. Wow, it's a small world after all! But there won't be room in it for everyone, so one person will have to stay behind. But we know that their nav robot-turned-killer will make that problem moot, unless the nasty Mars bugs eat them first. (Can anyone say, The Mummy?) Turns out the bugs ate all of the algae from the terraforming project, and produce oxygen themselves, which is why the crew can breathe. That doesn't even come close to accounting for the temperature and pressure changes, etc., that would be necessary for humans to breathe unaided on Mars. But Hollywood thinks we're all MORONS, right?
OF COURSE, then Kilmer (sole survivor) can't get off Mars after all, because the Russian batteries have died. In one of the few mildly interesting scenes, Moss talks to Kilmer when it seems he must surely be left to die. Can you say The Abyss? (Although far less moving.) As Moss prepares to leave, Kilmer realizes he can use the robot's battery to power the probe's launch, if he can get its battery while it's trying to kill him. He does just that, with NO problem, and launches the probe, into JUST the right orbit to rendezvous with the main ship, JUST in time!
OF COURSE, Moss must go EVA and snag Kilmer with a tether, and once inside she must perform CPR to save him. (The Abyss again!) At least Val brought a couple of bugs with him, to take back to Earth to be analyzed. Yippee, he's a hero! OF COURSE, nothing is really answered - there are tons of loose ends.
My description almost makes the movie sound like it could be mildly entertaining. Sorry. It isn't. 1/10.