Not surprisingly, this was one of the overlooked movies of 2000. However, unlike AMERICAN PSYCHO, RED PLANET deserved to be ignored! If not for the content itself, the movie suffers from glaring unoriginality in subject matter, as several other space dumps were also plopped into the collective toilet that is American theaters in the year of the new millenium. These others being MISSION TO MARS, SUPERNOVA, and the worst of the pile: BATTLEFIELD EARTH, though I don't like to mention them as the very mentioning of them may just conjure up a curiosity in one of my readers and invoke them to rent any one of these movies, spending hard earned money on hardly made flix. As I was saying...

RED PLANET takes place in the future, say 2025 or 2057, I forget which, as my lack of interest in the movie begin rather early. The Earth has finally reached it's limit, packed with way too many people and choked by way too much pollution. In an attempt to save the human race, scientists sent unmanned probes to Mars to plant a bio-engineered strain of algae on Mars's surface, in hopes it would convert the Carcon Dioxide atmosphere of the planet to an Oxygen one, allowing us to pack people into space ships like cattle and pollute a whole new planet. At first it seemed to have worked as the algae spread and overtook a good part of the planet's surface. Suddenly one day though, the algae started to disappear, and as always, none of Earth's big headed white coat folk could figure out why. So, they send a team of scientists to investigate. Actually, it's not so much a team of scientists than your average rag tag band of "like 'em or hate 'em" movie characters that we're apparently supposed to relate to... I don't know if that's true for anyone else, but I'd rather not try to dubm myself down enough to relate to any of these guys... and yes, "dumb" is purposely mispelled.

First there's the female anti-Captain of Mars-1, Bowman (Carrie-Anne Moss). Then there's her obviously romantic interest and the ship's "space janitor" Gallagher (sadly not played by the real Gallagher, but Val Kilmer), who becomes the "unlikely hero" that all movies like this are weighed down with. Hey, that shit was okay back when I first saw it with that whole "David and Goliath" story those stupid monotheistic Christians made, but that was millenia ago and the role's getting old. Also along to fill out the standard "Hollywood Rule of Six" (click the rolling head icon below for my Hall of Judgment Easter Egg on the "Hollywood Rule of Six"), are the asshole jock co-pilot, the world wise smartass bio-scientist, the mousey potential back-stabber, and the aged scientist-turned-philosopher. The first 15 or 20 minutes are like a quaint little summary of some of the more emotional and thought provoking moments of the crew's 6 month journey to the RED PLANET, featuring such gut-wrenching action as the philosopher exchanging stories with the janitor, the crew getting drunk off some astro-moonshine and bonding about how their lives suck, and the introduction of their pet AMEE: an ex-military exploration drone and potential killing machine... whoa, that sounds interesting... and predictable. Why do I suddenly smeel the potential for an ALIEN rip-off...

Finally the group meets their destination, as they find themselves closing in on Mars. Suddenly everything goes into "disaster escape TITANIC" mode, when a solar flare or something equally as space-like and confusing, frazzles the Mars-1's instruments, causing a massive power failure and many fireworks. All of the crew except for Bowman pack into an escape pod, leaving the good (in the sack) Captain behind to fend for her sinking boat. The team crashes down on the planet's surface and Bowman manages to eventually get the floating piece of multi-trillion dollar space junk back under control and running again. The rough landing the boys make is fatal for the philosopher, rupturing his vulnerable old spleen. He demands that the others leave him for dead, since their Oxygen will be running out soon and they need to uncover the locale of their safehouse habitat to restock their O2 and get some food and water. So, with a heavy heart, the janitor, the scientist, the jock, and the pussy leave him to die a slow and painful death... the "God" fearing are always the first to die... and that's the way it should be! So, with the old man left for dead, the other four make their way to safety. Another problem arises though, just to try and keep our story suspenseful, when the quartet discovers the habitat... devastated beyond repair and barren of any thing they could deem useful, like supplies and much needed Oxygen. If they weren't so worried about their air supply running out in about 7 minutes, maybe they could try to figure out just what happened.

With their life slowly slipping away at the passage of their countdown clocks, Gallagher and the scientist have one last chat about the missing algae while the dweeb and the jock try to setlle their differences. Being a jock though, the guy gets offended by the "pussy"s apology, tells the guy to go do his crying and carrying on somewhere else, and gets punched in the head for his big mouth! This wouldn't be a big deal with his helmet on, but the wind splintering force of the geek's impact knocks the guy off his balance, sending him toppling over a nearby cliff face and down to his lower gravity doom. Oh well, saves him from the pain of suffocation, right? Well, when the time finally comes down to it, it looks like certain peril wasn't as close as our heroes feared... As Gallagher is suffocating and on the brink of having his head explode, he decides to just take off his helmet. Sure enough, it's as I suspected all along: there's Oxygen on the planet's surface, left behind by the algae. Bet that weiner guy feels like a dickhead now! Get it, "weiner", "dickhead"?! Oh, if I weren't the God of Death, I'd kill me! Get it, "Death", "kill me"?! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH! Sorry, but RED PLANET is so boring I have to make up for it with bad puns. Speaking of boring, back with the review. Now, with air to breathe, the last three members of the party set up camp for the night in the tattered remains of their base camp... then AMEE comes home.

The advanced military kill-bot was dropped to the surface in the crashLike I said before, let the ALIEN rip-off begin, as the military tin can goes haywire when the guys, apparently having never watched 2001: A SPACE ODESSEY, try to shut the artificially intelligent metal beast down. Not ready for the scrap heap, AMEE goes into attack mode and backlashes at the boys, breaking the scientist's rib and smacking the others around, before it turns tail and frolicks into the darkness. Though injured, the trio discover the remains of the Mars explorer thingy we shot up there back in '97, detatch it's modem and modify it to call up to Mars-1. Back in contact with Bowman, she informs the guys that there's only one way off the planet: an abandoned Russian mineral collector several miles away. Problem? Only two people can fit into the thing... and that's not even comfortably. Combine that with the long trek to the craft's resting place and the 17 hour time limit they have before Mars-1 has to head back for Earth, it makes for a rather interesting situation... that gets completely ruined by a non-engaging movie. On the way to the the craft, the trio get stuck in an ice storm, taking refuge in a cave. While in the hole trying not to freeze to death, the feeb guy cofesses that he killed the meathead and he didn't really jump like he said. Fearing that this revelation will get him left behind, the guy grabs the radio and tries to sneek off in the middle of the night. But, this is when AMEE makes her move, jumping the run away and shredding his vital organs... guess that solves the problem of which two are going in the Russian tub.

After AMEE leaves and the remaining two recover their radio, they continue their journey, coming upon a batch of the genetically engineered algae. In it they doscover something unexpected: life forms. There's a group of insects who live off of the algae, spawned from the combination of oxygen, water, and carbon dioxide. Capturing a few of the bugs for research purposes, they continue on, not making it far before the insects smell blood and swarm all over the injured scientist, gnawing through his space suit and going up in a big boom as the guy lights them all in a last ditch goodbye to spare himself too much pain. Looks like Gallagher's the last guy left... and he's gonna have plenty of room to put his feet up in the Ruskie jump pod. When he makes it to the ship, he uses his link with Bowman to run a system test on the craft, find to his dismay that the battery is dead. Yet another "twist" that I could see a mile away... don't get me wrong, I like pretzels and all, but with all these little twists and turns, I'm afraid I'm gonna get this flick lodged in my windpipe. Of course, this is the perfect time for AMEE to arrive. Will she finish off Gallagher? In the famous words of Wayne Campbell, "ch, yeah, right!". Come on, in a movie this cookie-cutter, do you actually think the hero's gonna die?! Krist, we all know that this scene is just so Gallagher can kill AMEE and swipe her battery to power the Russian craft! And he does just that, trapping the beast in a parachute which he sets on fire. The metal monster panics, goes into self-destruct mode, and Gallagher swipes the battery moments before the thing goes *boom*... probably what's going to happen the first time someone makes a threat to the US while Bush Jr. is in office... Damn incompitent old fart. Don't look at me, I voted for the other guy! Besides, I tried to kill that Chaney putz, but sometimes money really CAN buy immortality! Now I damn modern medical sciences! Bah to you filthy humans! Anyway, Gallagher juices up the craft, sends himself into orbit, Bowman picks up her little hitchhiker love interest, the two share a MATRIXian "love conquers death" scene, and the film finally ends with the two getting ready for a lot of freaky space lovin' as they make the journey back to Earth. Oh, and to make matters worse, not only did the two survive, but somehow those bugs Gallagher managed to bring with him are going to help make the Earth green again... in the words of Val Kilmer, "fuck this planet"!

Plain and simple, and without wasting too much more space on this review, RED PLANET was all out bland, non-stop non-thrills, totally unengaging, and the break-out blockbuster stumble of the new millenium. The story was unbelievably unoriginal. The direction was heavily "influenced" by Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A SPACE ODESSEY. The villainous "robot-gone-wrong" AMEE, though pretty cool looking in itself and it's animations, was just another everyday computer gone bad. Yeah, it's a computer that was more like Giger's ALIEN than 2001's Hal (though many shots form the bot's point of view were just like Hal's), but it's still just a botched computer with claws. Val Kilmer gives the most 'laxed and secluded performance of his career, Carrie Ann-Moss STILL isn't hot, and everyone else was a little TOO unbelievable to, well, believe... don't read my words, read my meanings. The soundtrack lacked energy. I'm not saying it was a little underscored and sluggish, I'm saying that I do more when my ass is planted on the couch than this music did for the entire 110 minutes! Graeme Revell, if farted out more exciting tunes after a visit to Taco Bell... you should hear me do "La Cucaracha"! Anyway, RED PLANET was made to cash in on some apparently unknown to me frenzy for space movies, it failed, end of story. If ya want your money's worth, I suggest PITCH BLACK, probably the only good space movie of 2000.

DVD X-tras: Cast filmos and some more unimpressive deleted scenes. No big deal for a movie that's just that: no big deal. Hell, even BATTLEFIELD EARTH had a decent DVD... though I do crave bacon for some reason...

Sequels: None

If You Liked This Flick, Check Out: MISSION TO MARS or SUPERNOVA