Lost in Space

Frankly, I don't think this movie is as bad as some people make it out to be. I like the early episodes of the original series (particulary the first six), when the show had a more serious tone (and before Jonathan Harris sabotaged it by turning up the comic antics as Dr. Smith) and it's nice to see the film stay closer to that serious tone and not emulate the more campy aspects of the series from its later episodes. The cast is good for the most part and I love the visual FX.

However, once the Jupiter 2 crashes on the planet and we get caught up in the time travel older Will Robinson bit, that's when the movie falls apart completely. And the biggest mistake of all is that the older Will Robinson is not played by original Will Robinson, Bill Mumy, even though he badly wanted to play the part. Having listened to the comments of the director on why he didn't cast Mumy on the DVD, I have to say his explanation doesn't wash. Especially when both he and the scriptwriter concede that the device of using the "older Will Robinson" didn't work on the screen as it did in writing. It never occurs to them that maybe the scene would have worked if this new character sprung on us was someone with a definable connection to the old show.

Actually, I was quite surprised at how much fun I thought this movie was. Hardly perfect by any measure and, sure, there were some elements that were intrusive, but I found it to be quite faithful to the TV show - it used plots and elements from the early episodes. Even with the newer designs, they incorporated older aspects - the planet REALLY looked like a better version of one of their old sets.

Furthermore, Oldman managed to peg Dr. Smith perfectly, taking in all the old camp elements and putting them to very good use - even using some old catch phrases in different ways.

As diversionary, light sci-fi adventure goes, I thought this was great and I'm usually very picky about this kind of thing. It was fun and a pretty good kids' movie.

The only thing really missing was Billy Mumy.

Now, I don't think it was IMDb Top 250 material, not by far but it still should have been up in the "6"s. First let's look at the basic for the movie. Lost in Space was a television show from 1965 that was very low budget. I. Allen had to work from a shoestring and it showed. The show was a "kiddies" show, something that the kids enjoyed while Mom and Dad was able to snicker at the goofiness of it, (but not too loudly or the kids might get mad). Then the show progress into one that centered around three characters, that of Will Robinson, Dr. Smith, and the Robot. Mr. And Mrs. Robinson, Major West, and the girls were just so much window dressing and fodder. This is what the director of the movie, Lost In Space, had to work with. Either he kept as close to the original show as he could or he struck out in a totally different direction, such as what happen when they made Wanted Dead Or Alive for the big screen. It's not high drama, but then neither was the original show. Comparing it to the TV show, I believe that the director keep to the same spirit and I say it's not a bad rendering.

This remake of the successful '60's television show really is a waste of some good potential. It by no means is an horrible movie but the script isn't really interesting or spectacular and the character treatment is quite poor.

In a way this movie is a mixed bag. On the one hand it has some good actors in it and some of the special effects are really good but than again on the other hand the story is pretty shallow, the costumes are embarrassingly dreadful and some of the special effects are below average at best. Sounds weird, a movie that has both good and bad special effects in it. It's a bit weird, it's like they spend most of the time on the big special effects shots and after that they raffled the rest of the special effects. At times the movie is impressive to watch and at other moments it's just laughable bad to look at. Such as the CG character Blarp. He (or she?) looked absolutely dreadful and it made the movie even more ridiculous and bad to watch. But perhaps worst thing about the entire character is that it's a totally, completely unnecessary one that doesn't add anything to the story at all.

The movie has a solid cast. John Hurt certainly adds some believability to the silly moments in the movie and he deliverers some of the bad dialog good and even credible. Gary Oldman is of course also a great actor but he plays a bit of an uninteresting villain in this movie that doesn't get enough opportunity to shine. Matt LeBlanc is most of the time convincing in his role but he at times deliver some cheesy dialog which doesn't always make him believable as a tough space pilot. Mimi Rogers and Heather Graham also walk around in the movie but they get very little interesting to do. Good in her role was also Lacey Chabert. She's a good young actress, never really understood why she didn't appeared in more mainstream big Hollywood productions. She's an actress with great potential but somehow Hollywood never really picked this up. Maybe it has something to do with the failure of this movie?

Because yes, this movie is a bit of a failure. Not only in terms of how well it did at the box office and how well it was received by the crowd and critics but also certainly in terms of how the movie is constructed. The script is just disappointingly shallow and has some totally unlikely and unbelievable events in it, that at times don't even make sense. The story also uses too many elements from the first Star Wars trilogy and even a little bit from "2001: A Space Odyssey". It doesn't only uses story elements from that movies, it also rips off the looks of some of the spaceships, planets and city skylights. No, "Lost in Space" certainly isn't the most original science-fiction movie ever made.

The movie also lacks some good tension and action sequences. There are too many slow moments in the movie in which totally nothing happens. It's OK to have some slower moments in a movie but only when the script and characters are good and interesting enough to carry those slower moments. In this movie that really isn't the case.

This movie is not a complete disaster and the 4.6 rating here at the moment might be a bit too harsh. The movie does provide some good and entertaining moments. But if only the movie had a better and more original script, than this movie perhaps would had been a bigger success and certainly a better one to watch.

5/10

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Rating: * out of ****

Based off the old 60's television series, Lost in Space certainly had the opportunity to be a suspenseful and imaginative sci-fi adventure, but it ends up feeling like little more than an overlong pilot episode for a failed television series. What the movie does have going for it are some occasionally nifty special effects and a fairly tense scene set on board an abandoned spacecraft packed full of hungry giant spiders.

What the movie has going against it is generally everything else. The cast is thoroughly unconvincing (even William Hurt and Gary Oldman), a good portion of the special effects are second-rate, and the subplot involving time rips and time "bubbles" feels tacked-on and pointless. This is a silly adventure film that lacks tension and fun, or even competent film-making and writing. I'm certain kids will probably enjoy the movie, but most everyone else will probably feel mentally adrift by the time the end credits roll.