Max Q: Pouso de Emergência

Though advertised as a 'film' (i.e. theater movie) in the TV guide, IMDb confirmed the obvious signs of a TV movie. Things I thought were cheap: the use of the solo e.guitar to emphasize heroism (this effect is so cheap that refer to it as 'the p*rn guitar') and a man's choir to emphasize determination, or something. The wobbly camera in the a-drift (but stable) spaceship. I don't mean the shots done by the astronaut, those looked believable by its light-weight camera jerkyness. Things that needed a little imagination: The blowtorch, not only to imagine where the oxygen came from, but also how a soldering device can cut through metal (and give off sparks doing so). And why astronauts shift their weight from one leg to the other, moving around in a shuttle in orbit. Things that could have been worse: The animation of the tolling spacecraft, and how the crew experienced and handled it. The dialog - a lot of it sounded quite natural. There's no obligatory heat or animosity in discussions, no improbable loads of wit. Some cheesy stuff like the grinning bum in the end, or the surprise of the motorists on the improvised runway. Good for a chuckle though. Containing a lot of standard ingredients, but also showing skill (camera, lighting... no artwork however). Errors (out of laziness, time pressure?) and fair accuracy.

I pity the cast of this film.

Apparently Jerry Too-Much-Testosterone Bruckheimer didn't get enough space action with Armageddon so he had to slap this piece of crap together in about two months and throw it into an empty timeslot on ABC for god knows what reason. This abomination is highly inaccurate, badly written, and a complete insult to anyone who knows anything about flying or the space program. NASA deciding the day before launch to send a reporter into space.......HA! Even the Russians wouldn't do that. And using a blowtorch in space? Who was their tech advisor, Baghdad Bob?

But aside from the technical neurosis, the film comes across as a cheap attempt at a modern day Apollo 13 and a tax shelter (probably left-over money from Armageddon, since they didn't hire real writers for that either). All in all, don't bother with this one. If you want a good modern space movie, check out Space Cowboys. At least that one didn't have you groaning every five seconds like this one did.

This movie was pointless. I can't even call it sci-fi, since that requires more from a movie than merely taking place in space. "Max Q" isn't even set in space for the entire movie. The story/plot is unoriginal, the cast isn't anything to write home about, although it would be strange with a top cast in a mediocre film... Furthermore, it's not particularly exciting or well-told. At least it's evenly balanced in a low quality sort of way, in that nothing or no one stands out. Everything is equally bland. I usually find some quality in "space flicks", even if it's just 90 minutes of semi-lame entertainment bordering on low-budget pathetic, but "Max Q" didn't even give me that satisfaction. All in all , a complete waste of time.

Obviously the writers of this mulch had this brief - "Imagine Apollo 13 but on the shuttle with a sexy imperiled crew trying to get back to earth". If this sounds stupid, that is because it is.

Throw in some dreadful special effects, a low budget, a total disregard for reality & physics and a plot which consists of one over the top crisis after the next and a happy ending. The actors however do make the best of a bad situation, but this one is a total dud.

This film laboured along with some of the most predictable story lines and shallow characters ever seen. The writer obviously bought the playbook "How to write a space disaster movie" and followed it play by play. In particular, the stereo-typical use of astronauts talking to their loved ones from outer space - putting on a brave show in the face of disaster - has been done time and time again.

Max Q appears to have been written in the hope that the producers would throw $50 million at the project. But, judging by the latter half of the film which contained numerous lame attempts at special effects, the producers could only muster $50 thousand. To learn that the film was nominated for a "Special Visual Effects" Emmy has me absolutely gob-smacked.

I think a handful of high school students with a pass in Media Studies could have created more believable effects!

And the plot holes are too numerous to mention. But I will pick one out as an example. Now, I'm no NASA expert, but surely it's highly implausible that a worker attached to the shuttle simulator would suddenly hold a position of power in the control room when things start to go pear-shaped with the program. Surely there is someone more experienced at Mission Control who the Program Director would call on rather than a twenty-nine year old who has not been in the control room before.

The only saving grace for this film is the work of Bill Campbell. He manages to make a good attempt at salvaging something out of the train wreck that is this script.

I give this film 2 out of 10, with the above-average work of Bill Campbell in the lead role saving it from a lower mark.