Halo: Nightfall

In the 28th Century, the prolonged war between humanity and the fanatical alien alliance the Covenant has ended with a tenuous treaty. Despite the ceasefire, Earth's outer colonies remain vulnerable to the Covenant's covert intrusions. The ONI - Office of Naval Intelligence has been tasked with counterintelligence to beat the Covenant.

In Planet Sedra, Commander Jameson Locke (Mike Colter) and his team witness a Covenant's spacecraft and a Zealot Elite warrior disembarks with a bomb. They unsuccessfully try to stop the alien that explodes the bomb in a mall. They realize that it is a biological attack with an element fatal to humans. Sedran Commander Aiken (Steven Waddington) captures the middleman Axl (Jonathan Harden) that tells that the element is obtained from Alpha Halo, where the day longs 16 h and the temperature in the sunlight reaches 482o C. Aiken, Locke and his team head to Halo in the spacecraft Condor with pilot Macer (Christina Chong) carrying a Havoc weapon to destroy the place. On the arrival, they find two terrorists but are trapped in Halo by weird worms that are attracted by technology. And in five hours the sun will rise.

"Halo: Nightfall" is a good and underrated sci-fi adventure. The story was released edited on a DVD as a feature and it works. I have glanced at the negative reviews and apparently they belong to fans of a video game that are not satisfied with the movie. However, for those like me that do not play the game, this movie is highly entertaining. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "Halo: Nightfall"

Note: On 06 Mar 2022, I saw this film again.

It's the 26th century. There is a tenuous treaty between humans and the alien alliance called Covenant. Despite the peace, the Covenant is still sending operatives in a dangerous secret war. On an outer planet called Sedra, Commander Jameson Locke (Mike Colter) leads a squad hunting a Zealot Elite warrior with a suspected bomb.

I saw this as a ninety min Showtime movie. It has a lot less shooting than I expected. Actually I expected a lot less of everything from this movie. The acting is pretty good led by a capable Mike Colter. The characters are mostly one dimensional but that's fine for this type of movie. I like their conflicts once they get to the ring. The first part isn't as compelling and is limited by its production. Overall, I'm relief that it doesn't suck. It's not bad.

The worst thing about the pilot is that it is not that sci-fi. It starts promising, detailing the threat and "the mission", it shows the characters, then they all go to an isolated place where technology works against them. So basically, an entire setup for a medieval like quest, only on an alien world.

Other than that, the plot is predictable, but not terrible, the acting is good and it kept me watching it, even if I knew how it would end from the first half of the movie.

As I have not played the game, I have no quarrels with that aspect of the movie, however it did seem that it had nothing to do with how a specialized fighting force would behave in the 26th century. Also, it didn't really say anything about the Halo universe. As a complete noob, I had no idea who MasterChef (he he!) was and what a Halo was.

Bottom line: forgettable, but not that terrible. It did seem really low budget, though, and I have to ask myself what is the purpose of a low budget sci-fi series pilot which brings nothing in terms of story or characters? It only prepares an even less worked on series, right?

Update: didn't realize that "the pilot" was the whole first season. Heh!

21 November 2017. This television series, edited into a movie version along with Ridley Scott getting an executive producer credit for the first episode possibly for marketing purposes and brings another big screen story of the sci fi video game franchise to life. The Alien (1979) inspired spacecraft and landscape design are decent. Some of the early futuristic features incorporated into the movie are even more compellingly fascinating, including a scene resembling the window view of Tyrell's office from Blade Runner (1982). The script was overly ambition trying to incorporate both a monster story, a survival story along with a supposedly divisive cultural class story which the last component wasn't well depicted in the movie. Credit is well deserved for the improved version of the sci fi monster motif used in the movie, a definite improvement on the run of the mill monsters. One weakness that comes up is the somewhat incongruent topography changes and the mountain or crevasse scenes that don't always line up, especially one of the ending shots. The movie becomes a bit mushy and typically predictable with its incorporation of evil intentions even though there is some aura of moral integrity depicted. In some ways, it even follows some of the same overly dramatic script points in Journey to the Center of the Earth of 55 years prior to the release of this Halo. The ending climax is also a bit of stretch as to the apparent allowance of the idiocy that leaves open the opportunity to actually be able to kill someone, such is the use of a distinctly irritable script manipulation for the sake of an intended ending. In sum, this sci fi action, mystery, thriller comes across as a watchable, somewhat enhanced version of typical space adventure movies, but nevertheless not quite reaching the ranks of superior, quality sci fi.

It starts off so well but then they spent most of the time walking around with the odd thing happening. There is parts with action but I felt it could have used a lot more. The fact this is a Halo movie I expected loads of special effects and action like in the games but we did get that for a short period of time. After that it was minimised.