Roger Ebert said in his review, “The plot covers many
of the same bases as the recent "Deep Impact," which, compared with
"Armageddon," belongs on the American Film Institute list.” The movie
tells a similar story in fast-forward, with Bruce Willis as an oil driller who
is recruited to lead two teams on an emergency shuttle mission to an asteroid “the
size of Texas,” which is about to crash into Earth and kill everything – “even
viruses!” Their job: Drill an 800-foot hole and stuff a bomb into it, to blow
up the asteroid before it kills everyone.
Ebert asked, “OK, say you do succeed in blowing up an
asteroid the size of Texas. What if a piece the size of Dallas is left?
Wouldn't that be big enough to destroy life on Earth? What about a piece the
size of Austin? Let's face it: Even an object the size of that big Wal-Mart
outside Abilene would pretty much clean us out, if you count the parking lot.”
Ebert continued, “Texas is a big state, but as a
celestial object, it wouldn't be able to generate much gravity. Yet when the
astronauts get to the asteroid, they walk around on it as if the gravity is the
same as on Earth. There's no sensation of weightlessness--until it's needed,
that is, and then a lunar buggy flies across a jagged canyon, Evel
Knievel-style.”
The movie starts with a Charlton Heston narration
telling everyone about the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs. Then we get the eventful
title card, “65 Million Years Later.” The next scenes show an amateur astronomer
seeing the object. We see expert meetings at the Pentagon and in the White
House. We meet Billy Bob Thornton, head of Mission Control in Houston, which
apparently works like a sports bar with a big screen for the fans, but no alcohol.
Then we see regular people whose lives will be changed forever by future
events. Everything is completely stolen – there’s barely an original idea in
the movie.
“Armageddon” is said to had nine writers. Why did it
need any? Ebert said, “The dialogue is either shouted one-liners or romantic
drivel. "It's gonna blow!" is used so many times, I wonder if every
single writer used it once, and then sat back from his word processor with a
contented smile on his face, another day's work done.”
Disaster movies have little pieces of everything life.
The dumbest in “Armageddon” involves two Japanese tourists in a New York taxi. After
meteors set an entire street on fire, the woman complains, “I want to go
shopping!” Ebert said, “I hope in Japan that line is redubbed as "Nothing
can save us but Gamera!"” Meanwhile, we breeze through a romantic subplot
involving Liv Tyler and Ben Affleck. Liv plays Bruce Willis’ daughter. Ben is
Willis’ best oil driller. Bruce finds Liv in Ben’s bunk on an oil platform and
chases Ben all over the area, trying to shoot him. (You would think the crew
would be busy by the semi-destruction of Manhattan, but it’s never mentioned after
it happens.) Helicopters arrive to take Willis to take Willis to the mainland
so he can lead the mission to save mankind, etc., and he insists on using only
crews from his own rig – especially Affleck, who is “like a son.” Ebert said, “That
means Liv and Ben have a heart-rending parting scene. What
is it about cinematographers and Liv Tyler? She is a beautiful young woman, but
she's always being photographed while flat on her back, with her brassiere
riding up around her chin and lots of wrinkles in her neck from trying to see
what some guy is doing. (In this case, Affleck is tickling her navel with
animal crackers.) Tyler is obviously a beneficiary of Take Your Daughter to
Work Day.” She’s not only on the oil rig, but she attends training sessions
with her dad and her boyfriend, hangs out in Mission Control and walks onto
landing strips right next to guys wearing foil suits.
Characters in this movie actually say: “I wanted to
say…that I’m sorry,” “We’re not leaving them behind!,” “Guys – the clock is ticking!”
and “This had turned into a surrealistic nightmare!” Steve Buscemi, a crew
member who is diagnosed with “space dementia,” looks at the asteroid’s surface
and adds “This place is like Dr. Seuss’ worst nightmare.” What Dr. Seuss book
is he thinking of? Ebert noted, “here are several Red Digital Readout scenes,
in which bombs tick down to zero. Do bomb designers do that for the convenience
of interested onlookers who happen to be standing next to a bomb? There's even
a retread of the classic scene where they're trying to disconnect the timer,
and they have to decide whether to cut the red wire or the blue wire. The movie
has forgotten that *this is not a terrorist bomb,* but a standard-issue U.S.
military bomb, being defused by a military guy who is on board specifically
because he knows about this bomb. A guy like that, the first thing he should
know is, red or blue? "Armageddon" is loud, ugly and fragmented.” Action
scenes are put together at confusing pace out of hundreds of short edits, so
that we can’t clearly see what’s happening, or how, or why. Important special-effects
shots (like the asteroid) have a darkness of detail, and the movie cuts away
before we get a good look. Ebert said, “The few "dramatic" scenes
consist of the sonorous recitation of ancient cliches. Only near the end, when
every second counts, does the movie slow down: Life on Earth is about to end,
but the hero delays saving the planet in order to recite cornball farewell
platitudes.”
Ebert admitted, “Staggering into the silence of the
theater lobby after the ordeal was over, I found a big poster that was fresh
off the presses with the quotes of junket blurbsters.” “It will obliterate your
senses!” reports David Gillin, who obviously writes nonfictionally. “It will
suck the air right out of your lungs!” vows Diane Kaminsky.
If it does, consider it a mercy killing.
This is worse than “Deep Impact,” if you can believe
that. I remember seeing the beginning of the movie a long time ago when my
siblings were watching it, but when I watched it a few years back on Netflix, I
had wasted a good amount of time on this waste of a film. Don’t see it because
you will not like this one bit.
Now that we have those two abominations done, stay
tuned next week when I talk about a good movie in “Space Month.”
No comments:
Post a Comment