Spaceship

Oh dear. Just... oh dear. I like science fiction and I always enjoy seeing a good 'spaceship' type set. Just about the only two big budget 'spaceship set-type' movies of recent years were the Star Trek reboots and Prometheus. Therefore, I always try to give a space movie a chance. I shouldn't have bothered here. If you see this film out on DVD in the shops, you may notice its quite flashy box. Don't be deceived. The cover art is about the most expensive part of this whole film.

Basically, it's cheap. That's really all you need to know. During the opening scene, you'll get a sort of establishing shot of the outside of a giant spaceship. Only it looks like it was designed on a ZX Spectrum. I probably should have turned the film off there and saved myself an hour and a half. What follows is six kids (okay, teens – but they acted like kids in my opinion) trying to get rid of an (evil) artificial intelligence from the spaceship's computer. The kids wear cheap orange uniforms and I wonder which genius actually entrusted them to this critical mission? Surely the crew of the Red Dwarf would be more organised than this crowd? The spaceship is nothing new – white clean-looking corridors and... well, that's about it. Nothing new and certainly nothing expensive.

You won't give a damn about a single character. They're all equally bland. I guess I should be grateful they're not that annoying. Anyway, in this cheap 2001: A Space Odyssey set, you get a vague Event Horizon plot where the kids have to face their fears (or something – I was kind of tuning out by this stage). But, whereas Event Horizon had a cool Gothic feel for its decent, well-known actors to get lost in, this one is just cheap white corridors for its unknown cast to find – apparently – scary stuff in.

Yes, it's fair to say that I didn't like it. Granted I didn't really hate it, it's just there's nothing new here and nothing I have seen, only much better. If you like your 'spaceship movies' (like I do), just watch anything from Star Trek to Event Horizon (or Pandorum – I liked that, but no one else seemed to). Just forget this and ignore the enticing cover art on its DVD box.

Okay, it had one positive: the 'HUDs' (heads up displays) were kind of neat and I'd never seen that special effect before. But that alone wasn't worth an hour and a half of my time.

Though fun might not be the right word for it. Still if you have a thing for Science Fiction movies and do not mind, if they are low budget and filled with some gore and plenty of action. It also features very bad character decision and some questionable acting. But it's all in the fun of it (if you're having it, that is).

Actually the set design is not that bad for the money had. The blood and general special effects are more than decent too. You can see where this is going (in contrast to some of the characters and their very poor choices, but then again, they were criminals, more or less), so no surprises there. But the movie is done nicely and it is entertaining most of the time

The highlight of the movie is watching Sidney Leeder's character flirt, tease, and taunt other crew. She's one of the few characters that has some depth, motivation, and sense of fun.

Jason Momoa wasn't bad as a menacing AI, but he wasn't a character to empathize with - or even to love to hate. He ultimately had the 2 dimensional motivation of an AI following his programming, but with a maniacal murder streak. Without a truly 3 dimensional villain, he may as well be a glitchy computer or one with a loose wire. He seems to want to kill and torture... just because. Senseless violence is boring.

Some CGI was really entertaining. The best parts being those that blend into the scenes - like e-mail in their heads up displays. Parts of the ship were well done. The exterior shots were very well done.

Honestly, I think I'd have enjoyed the movie more without the killer AI - just fleshing out the prisoner characters' backgrounds and interactions more and their frustrations with the limitations of their freedoms. The movie is like a bad episode of Outer Limits where we get little exposition and narrative followed by mindless violence / action sequences meant perhaps to visually impress, but utterly lacking substance. Just having Momoa on a monitor talking was more menacing and entertaining than the whole opening sequence of the movie.

David Hewlett is one of my favorite actors. I applaud his effort in writing and directing a full length film. It's better than many made- for-TV Syfy channel craptastic flicks of the month. I think with some work, we could see this again in another form with more well rounded characters and a better story arc for the "heroes" and villain.

I wouldn't recommend the movie, but there are worse ways to spend your time. I'd describe it as having elements of Cube, Jason X, and Hackers. I'm hoping this was a proof of concept flick to show that David Hewlett is ready to take the helm of something larger.

This is one of the best on-a-shoestring-budget films I have seen in a while. The CGI isn't bad, the acting is solid and their is plenty of action.

All that said this movie isn't a great way to spend two hours. With a lot of indie films you can not only forgive dodgy effects but delight in them, they are somehow part of it. Debugs slickness actually works against it, the few dodgy elements like the ludicrously clean cut bad guy and the odd flickery greenscreen-work stick out like sore thumbs. Instead of a friendly, grungy production this has a distinct whiff of corporate Hollywood about it, which again makes it harder to love.

The story is straight out of a Twilight Zone episode, nothing special.

Actors mainly do OK, predictably the beautiful ladies get down to their vest and pants before the bad guy comes after them. I had no doubt who was going to make it out alive but to be honest I didn't really care.

A very good effort but Nothing special.

First of all: This is a low-budget movie and should be treated as such. If you're expecting state of the art CGI and explosions everywhere this might not be the film for you. If you're like me on the other hand then this might be exactly what you're looking for. The good thing about this movie, and a lot of other low-budget sci-fi, is that they aren't forced to do the usual "handsome guy falls in love while saving the world"-story. If you enjoyed movies like Solaris or Sunshine and aren't overly concerned with CGI then give this one a try. Don't get me wrong, just because the CGI isn't as good as you might be used to from a big budget movie doesn't mean this film looks in any way bad. The effects are actually pretty good for this type of film and the set is well made. Special mention goes to Sidney Leeder and the lead actress Jeananne Goossen. They both did a great job.