JoH-2

It was very interesting to go through some of the reviews here, and a few dedicated websites. You can say a lot about this movie, but NOT that it leaves people indifferent! We get the whole spectrum: people who didn't get it at all and didn't even LOOK for profound meanings. People who desperately try to read anything in it, looking for a way to agree that it is a work of exceptional art. People who consider themselves "smarter than smart" by pointing out that it is all nonsense, that "2001" just relies on pseudo-intellectuals hyping a self-assigned 'profoundness'. People who THINK they "got it", but only expose their limited intellectual capacities... Creationists, post-modernists and agnostics all finding something to their liking. :-)

And now it is my turn and I have to disappoint you: I do NOT have the definitive answer :-) What I DO know is that this movie wandered around in my head for quite a while! Some of its images,atmosphere and sounds are simply *unforgettable*. As someone else said: even if you were clueless, it still was a wonderful *experience* that made you feel out-of-this-world for a few hours. I have no problem admitting that figuring it all out was way over my head. Yeah, a few ideas about "man vs machine", the "birth of civilisation", the "next step of humankind", entered my mind. But the Big Picture? I felt rather stupid when reading all the brilliant and profound interpretations by people with 5 degrees in philosophy <G>

But it was worth it. I felt the emptyness, indifferent silence and immeasurable volume of space like never before. I sincerely questioned whether HAL was _killed_ or simply _shut_down_. I felt a chill down my spine when hearing the disturbing choir-music everytime a monolith was discovered. I got a feel for how absolutely BORING real-life spacetravel is destined to be, opposed to the typical Hollywood depiction. I learned to re-appreciate the authenticity of pre-CGI special effects. And all this from an old VHS copy on my ordinary TV set. I'd pay to see it again on the big screen, I tell you!

I enjoyed this one. Sure there were some implausible things: the speed of the counter-action, the strange fact that a complete change of the aerodynamics of a stealth bomber seems to cause zero disturbance... But all in all it was well within bearable limits. Don't expect to see a 100% realistic plot in a movie that is supposed to contain heros! In reality, they usually get shot or explode before they have the chance to become one :-)

Critical Decisions has a more than adequate mix of suspense, better-than-horrible acting, plot twists and mild humor to relieve the tension. Whereas a lot of movies in the same genre totally screw up one or more of those aspects. I'm thinking about the terribly balanced "humor" in The Rock, for example. Killing all tension and involvement..

8/10

JoH

"Coma" is one of those movies which for some reason made a powerful impression on me as a kid. Not through its story line, the acting or Geneviève Bujold(I was still too young to appreciate these "aspects" :-) ), but through an overall atmosphere. Such that, upon reviewing 20 years later, certain scenes trigger memories and almost puts me back into that couch as a 7-8 year old. Another of those movies is the weird early science fiction movie by George Lucas of which the title escapes me right now.

In "Coma", it was in particular the image of the "Jefferson Institute" building that recalled an evening somewhere in the late '70s. There's probably no movie featuring a more effective and suggestive modern-style horror house. For me, the "Jefferson Institute" complex perfectly impersonates and clenches the feeling that this intelligent thriller is trying to get accross. By its architecture and desertedness, it suggests sterility, impersonality, loneliness and the feeling of an industrial complex. The sterility of a medical system that does well in the technical aspect, but features a growing impersonality that makes it miss its primary goal: to make people feel good. The loneliness of Bujold, who is rather assumed by everyone to be paranoid than to be believed, even by her boyfriend. And the industrial feeling of a healthcare system that doesn't exist to cure people, but to keep itself alive as an industry (=profitable).

With the arrival of sophisticated genetic techniques, the medical horror genre is bound to return soon to the big screen. It will be difficult to do a better job than the concisely-titled "Coma"...

JoH