Hemisphere

I assume all the friends of family of filmmaker and actors wrote those reviews. This might have been an interesting short film, had there been competent acting. There was not.

In a space station, communications with Earth has ended. What has happened? Jim sends his ex-wife, a pilot? Investigator? To find out what happened. Though there is a working AI computer, and you'd think they'd just ask it. So she goes, and there's a body, and who killed him? A woman drops out of the ceiling and says "we were attacked." And then they sit and chat INTERMINABLY and the mystery is revealed and it's cliched and uninteresting and then the movie is blessedly over.

These reviews blow my mind. Are they all written by the same person? This movie was so... not good. I get that it had an extremely low budget, but the plot was trite, acting was unconvincing and overdone, dialog was incredibly poor, and the set - parts of this "space station" were obviously made of cardboard.

Look, I can forgive a lot for an indie production, but this is one that's worse than what an average freshman film major could do. Pass on this and save yourself 90 minutes.

EDIT: Four of these raving reviewers have reviewed only this movie and nothing else. Interesting. I'm the fifth I guess. I'm here to provide some much-needed counterbalance to this peculiar parade of praises.

As interesting and as obviously impressive as the Sci-Fi production values truly are, writer-director Chris Maes wisely chose to focus most of his minimalist budget and affecting narrative on his two excellent and very attractive female leads, their imperfect relationship and the desperate circumstances they are forced to solve as a team if they are to survive. The close interplay between the two felt very dramatic yet wholly natural and unforced and held my undivided attention throughout which speaks really well for this first time feature film director and his very talented crew from which I am eager to see more.

This cheap production has a better storyline than most high-budget Sci-Fi films

Forget the "spare bedroom set" (like, why would a spaceship have colonial shutters and laminate flooring?!), the dodgy equipment (fat laptops with USB plugs), etc., etc. And focus, instead, on the story.

• AI that is given absolute control and is used to evaluate every move and decision of the human user
• Highly commercialised space and planet-exploration, where decisions are taken against stock market decisions
• An employee base made up of underpaid individuals recruited solely to keep their lives afloat
• I could go on with the details of an excellent plot

Think of it as a stage production and it is really captivating, and very clever.

Sitting through this film I didn't know what to expect. What a pleasant surprise. Independent films sometimes out perform and Hemisphere is definitely one of them.

The director did a great job holding to those elements that were entertaining and impactful. I liked the conspiracy elements and the characters felt fleshed out - not an easy thing to do on a smaller budget. The sets were imaginative and visually compelling. The team here felt committed to what they were doing and it sure pays off. I've always liked these kinds of films and the filmmaking team pulls off a genre that is not easy to get right. Well done!! I couldn't recommend it enough!