Ferocious Planet

Gosh! Why all the bad reviews? It's a made-for-TV movie that could easily be turned into a series. I know John Rhys-Davies makes a cameo appearance and is killed off 5 minutes into this movie about sliding into a parallel dimension and the cast's frantic attempts to return, but there's no reason he couldn't be brought back for a TV series with that same concept. Heck, we could call the show "Sliders." OK, sarcasm mode off.

The acting was fine. The CGI, while limited (budget I suppose) was OK. However, the script was pathetic. I couldn't even find a credit for who wrote this. Was it unscripted or was the writer too ashamed? We get to hear one of the characters ask "are you tapping that?" The only possible purpose of the line at that point in the story was to demonstrate that the writer knows 21st century locker-room lingo. Hm... maybe that's it: it was written by a high-schooler.

Aside from the cheap lines, why do hack writers have to create military personnel incapable of following orders, otherwise intelligent adults suddenly incapable of cooperating and yet other adults in a life threatening emergency suddenly deciding that THEN is the time to hatch a transparent money-making scheme or wander off alone to examine the flora and fauna? The "don't poke the alien" line is funny, but several people manhandle the alien. While there's a certain satisfaction that one of the idiot characters gets what he deserves as a result of alien poking, it made absolutely zero sense.

With some good writing this have been a watchable -- even though rehashed -- film. I know I could have personally made something better of the writing. As it was, for the lack of any appreciable budget for decent writers, this film is a total waste of time.

This is a film made for the cable television channel SyFy which is probably as much information as you need to judge how good this film is.

Synopsis: A group of people are gathered in an underground laboratory in a Federal building, including scientists, military and politicians to see a presentation of an experiment into viewing other dimensions. There is an accident and instead of just viewing another dimension the whole lab is ripped out of our dimension and dumped into a parallel dimension populated only by plants and giant carnivorous CGI monsters. The survivors must find a way to repair the machine that brought them here and escape the ferocious creatures.

As always seems to be the case with SyFy channel films, the problem lies in the writing. An accident in experiment is one of the laziest and most ham-fisted plot devices in cheap science fiction.The CGI monsters are good enough for the price but there's no attempt to set them in a believable ecosystem. What do the creatures eat when there are no humans? The writer uses idiocy as a plot device in different ways to kill off characters either through arrogance, fear or greed.

Overall this was a mediocre and lazy film. I can't fault any of the actors too much since they were competent enough with what they had to work with. Joe Flanigan plays his standard wise-cracking soldier hero part. John Rhys-Davies is the cynical arrogant Senator. Dagmar Döring plays the scientist in charge of the project.

I give it an 8 mainly for the good slips of humor that they give the audience here and there. Which is good, because if they tried to be totally serious, it would have felt corny.

My favorite: "Rule: Don't poke the alien." It was an interesting mix of characters thrown together by an experimental demonstration gone wrong (of course!) And a bunch of Washington Senatorial aides, scientists and a few marine guards are thrown into another dimension. Now how do they get back? What's nice about this flick is that the script doesn't really follow the tried and true tropes we come to expect from 'Scientist Experiments Gone Wrong' but sends the viewer towards different outcomes. . .with a bit of humor interspersed with the gore.

And the ending was. . .interestingly open to interpretation.

This is a good Saturday Night 'B' Flick. Not bad for SyFy.

What amazes me the most about this movie is that there are actually people thinking it is a good movie. Really? Ferocious Planet is a complete waste of your time, a waste of money that could have been spent in making something watchable. The story itself could have been good if you only had a good script writer. It could have been good if you had decent actors. But really, this acting was awful to watch. terrible actors! Not one good actor in the whole movie. Terrible lines, so cheesy that you wonder who would write something like that. He can't seriously not be making a living out of this. One thing is for sure, I won't ever forget about this movie, because the only things you remember are the real good movies and the dramatic failures like Ferocious Planet.

There are a few problems with this TV movie from the emasculated Syfy Channel. I throw up a little in my mouth when I have to write its new name. Overall it's watchable and a traditional Radiation Theatre film. Here are some fun things about Ferocious Planet which I like to call The Quasi-Ferocious Planet.

Most actors had American accents at the beginning but the Irish started coming out toward the end. CarrieFisher-idice!

So this is John Rhys-Davies' new career. Show up for the 100K. Film a scene or two and get killed? He's done that like nine times. I wish I had a job like that.

Apparently there is only one type of creature inhabiting this forest on this random parallel universe. No bugs,snakes or creepy things to give us some cool jump moments. Too bad. Oh well, there was this mushroom but it didn't really do anything.

"We're out of time" is said so often I was truly convinced they were out of time.

The writer(s) apparently loved Jaws, Jurassic Park and Alien as a kid (who didn't!) Too bad writer(s) couldn't find a more appropriate place to use the homage line, "You're gonna need a bigger boat".

The science of how they got to the F. Planet in the first place was unintelligible, like a madman writing on a wall. It was a view scope to other dimensions that suddenly became a transporter device because . . .

Using only one creature (who looked like a Swiss Army Knife) mixed with the unusually high body count resulted in fewer creative kills. Just a Dinosaur with razors everywhere on its body.

Must say the effects were better than an average SyFy crap on a stick. OOps threw up a little again.

In summation, too many missed story opportunities and it drags towards the end.

So I leave you this advice: Don't poke the alien.