Pandorum - Review

Genre: SciFi/Horror/Thriller

Starring: Dennis Quaid, Ben Foster, Cam Gigandent, Antje Traue, Cung Lee & Eddie Rouse

Written By: Travis Milloy

Directed By: Christian Alvart

The movie is set in a future where Earth's population has grown beyond its resources. Dennis Quaid (Lieutenant Payton) and Ben Foster (Corporal Bower) portray members of a flight crew charged with maintaining the space ship Elysium during their two year shift. When the men wake from hyper-sleep, they are disoriented with no memory and realize they are missing a member of their crew. To make matters worse, they seem to be locked in a single room, the ship's systems are offline and the reactor is in serious need of repair.

The men get the computer station functioning and Lieutenant Payton guides Corporal Bower as he makes his way out of the room through the ventilation shafts. On the other side he finds fellow passengers and what appears to be an alien species. As Corporal Bower makes his way through the ship to fix the reactor and find other passengers, the story unfolds and we find out along with the crew what happened aboard Elysium, what happened to the other passengers, where the alien race came from and where the ship is headed.

The acting, what there is of it, is good. In fact, Ben Foster is amazing. Dennis Quaid is great as well, though he is not given enough opportunity to show his range. I enjoyed the story; however, it seemed incomplete. Some things were brought to light, but not explored. The screenplay is set up to divulge little tidbits of information as the movie goes forward, eventually revealing the big storyline. Unfortunately, the exposition is not done well and the story becomes more predictable the more time passes.

As for the horror/thriller aspect, I missed it. There was nothing truly scary or thrilling about this movie. There was barely a moment of suspense. The best way I can think to describe the movie is to think of Aliens, if it had been written by M. Night Shyamalan. A scifi movie with a psychological suspense component.

Overall, the movie was okay. Not wonderful, but not complete crap either. I was excited to see this movie from the first time I saw a trailer. For me, the movie was a disappointment. Plenty of good, just not enough to live up to my expectations. Would I recommend seeing it? Yes, but add it to your Netflix queue or wait to rent it when the dvd is released. It simply is not worth spending the outrageous movie ticket price to see it in the theater.