Survivor

Having read the synopsis for this movie, I must admit that I didn't really expect too much from it, and now having seen it, I can honestly say that the movie lived up to the low expectations.

The story is about the last of mankind searching the vast reaches of space for an inhabitable planet. A spaceship tracking a signal has to go into a wormhole, when disaster strikes. The ship is torn apart and the surviving crew is stranded on the alien planet, having to fight for their very lives to stay alive, against hostile humans and monstrous humanoids.

The storyline was essentially adequate, albeit a bit too simple. And there was a bit too much focus on Danielle Chuchran's athletic skills for running and rock-climbing.

The creatures in the movie were looking more like a crossbreed between the orcs and trolls of "Lord of the Rings", which just made the movie seem like a half-hearted attempt at a Sci-Fi movie. And while we are speaking of "Lord of the Rings", the scenes with Danielle Chuchran running around the barren rocky landscape with a panning camera flying around was just too much like the scene where Legolas was running around. At least do something original...

The reason for me sitting down to watch the movie was Danielle Chuchran and Kevin Sorbo. And sure, they made the movie watchable and endurable, but they were struggling hard with an almost non-existing script and storyline.

"Survivor" is a below average Sci-Fi movie, and if you are in for an evening of Sci-Fi, then I would suggest that you find something else, because this movie is not really worth it.

A mere 4 out of 10 stars to "Survivor".

Danielle C. Ryan runs so much in Survivor that I started training for a 5k race because of it. She runs on hills, rocks, and more rocky terrain. She even would run underwater if she could. She scales cliffs, darts through caves, and unsympathetically tells her crew mate "you're going to die" (maybe because she's not a good runner?). Most of the movie is like a cross-fit advert.

It has a weak story and every enemy overacts (i.e., flips, spins through air, flails, etc.) when killed but if you watch Survivor with low expectations it's not terrible.

There is almost no plot after a scout ship crashes on unknown planet, unless you count Kate traveling 60 kilometers over semi-mountainous terrain to rescue her injured captain and then a score more to find the crash site so she can send a distress beacon.

There is very little dialogue for at least half the movie, which is good because Danielle Chuchran delivers it poorly in quick but flat lines.

One thing is for certain. Kate, who has lived all her two-score years of life on a space ship is in physical shape that boggles the mind. She runs and climbs and runs and climbs. In crashing, Kate falls out of the scout ship and plummets apparently miles but opens a tiny chute about 50 feet above the water and survives. Then she gets knocked out and captured, but her captor is gone when she wakes up so she escapes. He or another of the natives (all wearing masks) traps her again, but she escapes again by simply climbing away. Chased by a half-dozen or more natives who are almost on top of her, somehow she is magically away from them and "safe". Three monsters corner her with three arrows left so she climbs a sheer cliff, then shoots at least twice that many arrows to kill them all.

More running, more impossible fighting. The monsters have 4 inch claws but never use them and outweigh Kate 2-1 but she defeats several of them in hand to hand several times.

Finally some plot and dialogue with about 20 minutes left in this 1-1/2 hour film. And the plot is not that great.

In this part of the movie, natives remove their clumsy masks which appeared to be for breathing, but apparently they don't need them.

Chuchran has a pretty enough face, if you enjoy looking at a dirty girl with unkempt hair. But she is not enough to carry this movie with its ridiculous fights and lame plot. Wait til you see the ending.

I was pretty much captivated by the lead actress and would have turned it off after 15 minutes if not for her. That face! My guess is she played some kind of sport growing up because she's athletic and easily the best part about this movie since she lends some credibility to the action sequences and has amazingly expressive eyes. As an aside Hollywood seems to have forgotten how important facial expressions are in conveying what is going on, preferring to dazzle with effects and hammer you over the head with inane dialogue.

Anywho, Chuchran does a great job, but it's just too rough with too little plot for anyone to overcome.

This "movie" is about a running blond pretty girl. Originally she came from a spaceship, but that does not matter very much. The story is paper thin or to say it precisely, there is no story. It is one of that stories which is that flat, that it bends time and space and you know not only from the beginning how this movie will end, you will just know the complete plot. Thats because you have seen this story in 10 other equal cheap "Oh no! My spaceship crashed!" scifi movies. I am pretty sure the screenplay was not longer then. "Ships having an accident, then pretty girl runs around, kills some evil dudes, finds a horse yadayadayada the end." Its one of that movies you can watch when you already planned to fall asleep at your couch or when you are drunk like a skunk and want to watch some easy nothing. If you watching it sober, you will for sure fast forward half of the movie.