A&E Television has stepped forward with a dramatic movie, highlighting its steps to join FX and Spike Television (among others) with unique programming that sets itself apart from broadcast television. In that aspect it has succeeded. The choice they have done this with is a remake of the Andromeda Strain.
For those unfamiliar, The Andromeda Strain is a book from 1969 and then a movie first done in 1971. It’s a tale of a virus that hits the earth via a meteorite. It devastates an entire remote town in the U.S. and a highly specialized team of scientists is organized to destroy or contain the virus. The only clue that the scientists have to work with is the fact that an old drunk and a baby are the only survivors of a town with a few hundred people.
While that is the basis of the remake there are significant changes. Some are quite good, others not as much. And most of the intensity of the film is destroyed in this 4-hour extended made-for-TV film.
I will note that I hate the current trend of re-visioned movies and programs that an idea starved Hollywood is rife with these days. In almost every re-visioning the effect is a sledgehammer to the original idea, seemingly made by someone who never saw the original and basically just read a Cliff note on the subject in question. This film is not a re-visioning because most of its first 2 hours are true to the original. Beyond that, it starts to deviate.
A&E’s version (AS) isn’t bad, though it’s incredibly too long. They took a 90 minute film and dragged it out as far as it could be taken. And you feel it. Add to this the addition of several storylines that are blatantly obvious in their political underpinnings and you get a story that is reaching for high moral ground and failing to be as entertaining as it could be. That is not to say the original was not political as well, it was just concise and not overburdened by it.
This version is weighed down with the baggage of an attack on the U.S. military’s stance on gays, distrust of the Government, international bioweapons development, environmental conservation, the Patriot Act, infidelity, and seedy journalism. That leaves out the questionable physics of a wormhole, the abilities of the Andromeda strain organism and a conspiracy theory. Oh, and a minor love story too, nearly forgot that.
There are huge plot holes in the storyline because of this expansion and focus on everything but the threat at hand. Add to that ok but not stellar acting (of Braugher, Benjamin Bratt, Rick Schroeder, Viola Davis, Daniel Dae Kim, Christa Miller. Competely useless were Eric McCormack, Ted Whittall, and the other background characters) and you have a watchable but not rewarding mix.
Problems of the movie include the origination of the Andromeda strain in the first place, time continuity, how the strain sample was recovered since it was capable of escaping it’s container, how the radiation in the mechanical shaft did not kill the lead scientist, how the scientist trapped with the released strain survived, why the baby and old man continued to survive, and how the strain took so long to start to spread since buzzards were present immediately after the outbreak, and the intelligence of an organism that is sulfur based without DNA that communicates with parts that are completely seperated.
Plus the cover-up which included the murder of Andre Braugher seems inconsistent and useless since the reporter with all the details escaped. Of course the dig at President Bush and his administration is hard to miss (though little is shown of a better Presidential choice). Also the inevitability of the U.S. Government causing the death of mankind because of a shadow organization seems consistent with the current stance of Hollywood’s anti-military stance.
I could go on, but you get the point.
Like I said the movie is ok. It might have been far better had they stuck to the issue at hand, a mystery disease of extraterrestrial origin. The attacks on non-liberal ideas and Presidents (unless you think the connection of underwater mining being run by the fictional President’s corporate election backers is just coincidental) really just makes the other shortcomings too big and long.
If you want to rejoice in the horrors of global warming I-told-you-so, or paranoia over the government listening to everything you do, I’m sure this is on your must see list along with JFK and Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth. Otherwise, skip this unless you are really bored or are stuck in Binghamton New York.
No comments:
Post a Comment