Deus - La sfera oscura

I came upon this almost by accident and rolled my eyes at it till I saw Claudia black who has some credibility, listed in the cast. She does a good job with the material and gives a great performance throughout. Her performance gives her character some depth which in truth, the screenplay seems to miss somewhat, but she can't singlehandedly carry this one off. The script needs another once over with a fresh pair of eyes if I'm honest, as much of the dialogue is like something out of a comic book, cliched, meaningless and stilted.

The story is a reasonably good one if a little predictable, but the premise is sound. However there simply isn't enough going on to keep the interest focused, and the lengthy scenes and uneventful screenplay lend little to maintain interest.

The special effects, CGI are all decent, nothing to write home about, but they don't let the movie down the way the script and story line do. I'm always a little sceptical when the writer and director are the same individual since what is perceived in creation isn't always the best way to flesh it out on film, and here my concerns are warranted. One or the other is my rule of thumb and rarely does it bode well for a creation with a single person doing both.

I think much of the films forced ambiance are due to a lacking in direction, and some of the characters are way off base. 'Grey' and 'Sen' played by Black and Blackwood are a constant source of contention with no clear command structure seemingly in place. Its an odd way to spin a relationship in space with a mission of such importance, and it neither works here nor rings true. There are other weird glitches throughout the movie and it serves only to kink the smooth flow of events as they unfold on-screen. I found it most disconcerting.

Blackwood delivers the whole compliment of his lines through clenched teeth as though he's stemming the overflow of some long held rage with great difficulty. His stiff, stoic delivery makes him stand out as the weak talent in this cast of less than ten people. Again I think this is more due to bad direction rather than a failing of his talent, but irrespective, the movie suffers as a result. David O'hara by contrast plays his character to a 'T' and the other cast members with more minor roles are accomplished enough, but forgettable.

On the whole it's not too bad, but there just isn't enough going on here to bring off the story, and some of the cliched developments really do it a disservice.

I think 5 is an honest and fair score, for what is at best, a 'watchable' movie. Its not a big production so I don't want to be overly critical knowing it couldn't have been an easy one to produce, but I think the scant flesh on the carcass of this one is its big problem. It really needed some fleshing out before being served up to feast.

In the future, the Earth is being crushed by over-population. A mysterious black sphere is orbiting Mars and tycoon Vance sends the spaceship Achilles to investigate. Karla Grey (Claudia Black) is one of the six person crew waking up from hibernation. The sphere starts repetitively transmitting one word, Deus.

This is a British sci-fi film that is a bit above TV level but not quite theatrical level. The first half has elements of sci-fi horror. That's what I'm expecting when one of them starts killing. It's sort of like Event Horizon with less gore. The writing is a little clunky. The most obvious sign is that everybody keeps calling Karla Grey by her full name. It's not dialogue. It's a writer writing down words. Then it delivers its big reveal. Without spoiling, I can say that I appreciate the attempt. It reminds me of an old sci-fi magazine story with a twist. It doesn't really work in the real, but it has hints of something solid.

You can tell newb writer and director Steve Stone's inexperience was evident in this film, especially failing to direct his cast properly. Even Claudia Black looked lost in some scenes, and Richard Blackwood as the commander was just horrible and unconvincing in every scene, not to mention annoying. His demeanor, (lack of) facial expressions and body language, tone of voice and dialogue was just all wrong.

Conceptually the story was interesting, but it suffered plot and technical issues, and the slow pacing with many long dragged out and unnecessary scenes made the normally comfortable 90 min runtime feel much longer. It needed more story to fill in the time, or cut down to a short film. Much of the dialogue felt very amateurish, especially the AI, and writing could've used more suspense and action instead of constant cam views and cheesy cheap random shots.

The visuals however were decent for a low budget B film, and the score was excellent, especially for a B film, where the score is usually too loud, constant, annoying and unfitting.

As a huge sci-fi fan, I still enjoyed it, as I've seen much worse, and seeing it through till the end says a lot. For a low budget B film from a newb filmmaker, I'd say it's a decent one-time watch if you're a sci-fi fan. Had the actors been better cast and/or directed, this film would've been much better. Still, a generous 6/10 from me.

OK. So we have to be realistic... SciFi films don't exactly must be scientifically accurate (yeah.. Darth Vader isn't real, right?). But at least show some coherence. A sphere is found in Mars orbit in a future far enough to hibernate people and wake them back, and build a really big ship with artificial gravity, then they took 8 months to reach Mars? I am pretty sure SpaceX will do better in a few years... And using hibernation for an 8 months trip in such a large ship with a handful of crewmates? Are you kidding me?

Cast was fairly good, and I am sure they spent a good deal of money in this film, yet the script is poor, to say at least. Don't waste your time as I wasted mine.

Now, I am not really a big fan of the sci-fi genre, but I will watch movies of said genre when given the opportunity. And with "Deus" being a movie that I had never heard about, nor seen, of course I opted to sit down and watch what writer and director Steve Stone had to offer.

And while "Deus" definitely had an interesting cover/poster and synopsis, the movie just wasn't really all that interesting. Sure, "Deus" was watchable, but it just wasn't a particularly thrilling or overly entertaining movie, as the storyline was somewhat flaccid and bland.

The acting performances in "Deus" were adequate. I wasn't familiar with the cast ensemble in the movie, which is usually something I enjoy when watching movies. But the actors and actresses had precious little to work with here in terms of a properly written storyline, so they didn't really have much of any chance to unfold themselves on the screen.

Visually then "Deus" was good. I liked the special effects and the CGI. And it definitely felt like the movie took place deep in space near Mars. And that added something to the movie, which was otherwise struggling with a mediocre script.

I am sure that hardcore sci-fi fans might get a kick out of a movie such as "Deus" from writer and director Steve Stone. However, as a casual viewer, then "Deus" was not an impressive or memorable movie experience.

My rating of "Deus" lands on a four out of ten stars.