Pandorum Review

Thanks for checking out our Pandorum review. I’m a sucker for just about anything with Dennis Quaid in it (he’s one of the only reasons I had any hope at all for G.I. Joe), and Ben Foster is evolving into one of the best actors working in Hollywood today (his performances in “30 Days of Night” and “3:10 To Yuma” were just absolutely mind blowing). Combine that with the fact that I get excited about almost any Sci-Fi movie and you end up with Pandorum being very high on my list of films I’ve wanted to see this year. It struck me as a sort of “Alien” type of movie (sci-fi/horror). So off I went to check it out this weekend. Did it disappoint? Yup… sure did.

THE GENERAL IDEA

The synopsis for Pandorum reads something like this: “Two crew members are stranded on a spacecraft and quickly – and horrifically – realize they are not alone. Two astronauts awaken in a hyper-sleep chamber aboard a seemingly abandoned spacecraft. It’s pitch black, they are disoriented, and the only sound is a low rumble and creak from the belly of the ship. They can’t remember anything: Who are they? What is their mission? With Lt. Payton staying behind to guide him via radio transmitter, Cpl. Bower ventures deep into the ship and begins to uncover a terrifying reality. Slowly the spacecraft’s shocking, deadly secrets are revealed…and the astronauts find their own survival is more important than they could ever have imagined.”

THE GOOD

As expected, the performance of Ben Foster as Bower was impeccable. The role was a challenging one. A role that called on the performer to convince an audience of complete bewilderment, confusion, fear, intensity, bravery, terror and excitement all at the same time without going overboard on any of them. When Foster’s character wakes up completely unaware of who he is or where he is, he conveys it perfectly, and continues to do so throughout the movie. I’ve got to confess that despite the fact that I still believe Dennis Quaid is a better actor than Foster, he stumbles a bit through the movie and doesn’t come across nearly as convincing as Foster does. Foster almost saves this movie… but doesn’t. Which leads us into….

THE BAD

First of all, the “mystery” of the monsters we see in the trailers was about as un-mysterious as you can get. “Oh no… what are these monsters… where did they come from… and what happened to all the passengers”? I bet if you didn’t even see the trailer and JUST read that line, you’d already guess what the monsters are, where they came from, and what happened to the passengers of the giant ship. Yes… the monsters are former passengers. There… I spoiled it for you. If you didn’t figure it out for yourself already, then you probably can’t read either, and thus I didn’t spoil anything for you at all.

Within the exposition of the story, you can clearly tell the director Christian Alvart was attempting to make observations on commentary on the condition of humanity and our base nature. These are great things to utilize when tapping into a story like this one… however you have to tap into them, or observe them, or comment on them WELL. To me they just came off as trite afterthoughts instead of existential dilemmas on the condition of man. What that leaves you with is nothing more than a monster horror movie in space, which feels quite hollow considering you KNOW they were going for much much much more.

But even then, “monster horror movies in space” CAN be a lot of fun. But even on that level Pandorum fails. The “monsters” have nothing interesting about them, nor do they really scare you at all (if they could have JUST pulled that off, it could have gone a long way to redeeming the film). Also… for those of you who have seen the movie… please tell me how on earth one of these borderline mindless monsters learned kung-fu?

The ultimate mystery of the film is essentially irrelevant. Where is the ship now and how did they get there SHOULD have been the ultimate questions throughout the film, but never does the audience care or are made to feel the need to care. By the time the “mystery” is revealed at the end it feels pointless. A big “reveal” in a movie should do something to alter how an audience perceived or increase their understanding of all that came before it (think of how the reveal in “The Sixth Sense” does that), but in Pandorum, it’s just another fact to end the movie that on a practical level changes or would have changed anything else in the movie up to that point, and thus felt like useless noise by the time they finally got to it.

OVERALL

Overall, Pandorum is an intelligent idea for a movie that isn’t executed intelligently. A mystery film with no mystery. A horror film with no horror. A monster movie with lame monsters… and although it clearly tries to be much more and much deeper than any of that, it falls well short and ultimately comes off as a movie that thinks it’s smarter than it is. A terrific performance by Ben Foster almost makes it watchable, but doesn’t get you there. Overall I give Pandorum a 2.5 out of 10.

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45 thoughts on “Pandorum Review

  1. You misunderstood the basic plot and overlooked details of the film, John.

    They were not transformed passengers but their evolved descedants as nearly thousands of years went by. The filmmakers even mention this on the DVD. What happened was that their ancestors went insane with Pandorum and their unstable minds were manipulated by Gallo to play cannibalistic games. The creatures were continuing said game as part of a generations long tradition.

    Read all about it here.
    http://commentaryandcritiquing.blogspot.com/2013/07/pandorum-loveletter-to-hp-lovecraft.html

  2. Someone recently mentioned this review on IMBD. Why would you think they former crew members? They had to over 900 years old for that to be true. The film didn’t fail as mystery, you failed at putting any critical thought when watching this movie!

  3. I know this is an old review but clearly does not kung fu is. Also here is a rebuttal for this review which I found to be eye rolling. Former crew? That would make make thing over 900 years old. You clearly missed the entire point of the film.

  4. Yeah, John I think you seriously missed the entire point of the monsters. If they were the passengers than that would mean that they are centuries years old. The twist revealed that they were sleep for 800+ years. They were the descendants of the crew that went crazy and became cannibals. They evolved slower over generations and generations to adapt to which a life style.

    The film was exploring aspects of the phase “Survival of The Fittest”which is about evolution, competition, adaption, and cooperation. All of that was in the film.

  5. Btw, I have to say this.

    “Within the exposition of the story, you can clearly tell the director Christian Alvart was attempting to make observations on commentary on the condition of humanity and our base nature. These are great things to utilize when tapping into a story like this one… however you have to tap into them, or observe them, or comment on them WELL. To me they just came off as trite afterthoughts instead of existential dilemmas on the condition of man. What that leaves you with is nothing more than a monster horror movie in space, which feels quite hollow considering you KNOW they were going for much much much more.”

    The very title of Pandorum suggests Pandora from mythology that was a story about the degradation of the human condition. They do make references to it in the film which I noticed right off the bat. So I didn’t find it hallow at all.

  6. “The ultimate mystery of the film is essentially irrelevant. Where is the ship now and how did they get there SHOULD have been the ultimate questions throughout the film, but never does the audience care or are made to feel the need to care. By the time the “mystery” is revealed at the end it feels pointless. A big “reveal” in a movie should do something to alter how an audience perceived or increase their understanding of all that came before it (think of how the reveal in “The Sixth Sense” does that), but in Pandorum, it’s just another fact to end the movie that on a practical level changes or would have changed anything else in the movie up to that point, and thus felt like useless noise by the time they finally got to it.”

    The real mystery of the film was “how is the reator failing in only 8 years when it was build to out last our childern’s childern?” and “how come the passengers mutanted but we haven’t?” Basically, the ultimate question was how long have they been out there. Plus I don’t recall the monsters knowing Kung Fu.

    SPOILERS:

    They’re not really the passengers but devolved descendants of them.

  7. I agree, I also had no expectations whatsoever from this movie. It seemed to follow the reverse formula of science fiction horror films for a while, which usually start out with a known number of crew members, which then gradually gets reduced until the end of the movie, where everyone is dead, save one or two. In this movie, there were only two characters in the beginning, but as Bower explored the ship, he actually added to his numbers! I didn’t predict that the ship was underwater. I guessed they had already landed, and they were going to find those cannibalistic monsters were just everywhere on the planet and some of them had got inside. That was until the wacky old guy explained the entire plot, and the woman talked about the evolution thing that was injected into them. From a science point of view though the whole movie is a mish mash of half baked ideas, with a ship escaping from a destroyed world, rapidly evolved humans turned monsters, a sickness that makes people go crazy, some dude trying to turn on some reactor, the ark with all the samples of life and all that crap. They should have just stuck with one theme, and focused on that instead of trying to make the plot about 20 different things at once, but not explaining or emphasising any one of them adequately to make the viewer care at all. For example, its a ship in space, but everyones going crazy. Or, its a ship in space, but everyone is turning into monsters. Or, its a ship in space, but the captain became an evil maniac. Not, all of the things at once.

    Basically, this entire movie can be summed up in the following 5 lines:

    1) guy A to guy B) why’s there no power? we should turn on the reactor.
    2) guy B to guy B) good idea, you go and do that, and i`ll stay here and do nothing except occasionally mumble on the radio.
    3) guy A to guy B) This ship is full of monsters, its making it very difficult to get the reactor. Plus, I met a girl and a guy who doesnt talk english.
    4) guy B to guy A) OK, im still doing nothing. Just sitting here, good luck with the monsters.
    5) guy A to self) I found the reactor! Now i can switch it on, return to the bridge with the girl, and escape! The end.

  8. I agree, I found Pandorum worth watching as long as you didn’t try to analyze it or find a deeper meaning than what was intended. The ending was a twist that I didn’t see coming, and I’ve been watching movies for many, many years. I did have a chuckle or two at the obvious ‘Aliens’ references. I’ve learned not to get overly cerebral where horror movies are concerned, it takes the fun out of them, and that’s why I love them, because they’re fun. Unless they’re not. Then I get very angry….

  9. “The ultimate mystery of the film is essentially irrelevant. Where is the ship now and how did they get there SHOULD have been the ultimate questions throughout the film, but never does the audience care or are made to feel the need to care. By the time the “mystery” is revealed at the end it feels pointless. A big “reveal” in a movie should do something to alter how an audience perceived or increase their understanding of all that came before it (think of how the reveal in “The Sixth Sense” does that), but in Pandorum, it’s just another fact to end the movie that on a practical level changes or would have changed anything else in the movie up to that point, and thus felt like useless noise by the time they finally got to it.” – Reviewer John C.

    So, I have to take issue with this entire paragraph both as a Cine-Fanatic and as an engaged film watcher! First, the “where are we?” question was not and could not have been the central question of the film because this is not a film about destinations. This is a film about “it doesn’t matter where we are because we still try to rip eachother apart!”

    Second: additionally I didn’t feel myself ‘caring’ about where they were and I wasn’t upset with the fact that the characters seemed mystified by the origins of the monsters because I do not suffer from that all too common malady of reviewers (and film-goers alike) known as “Omniscient-itus” wherein you project your ability to See All from outside the screen as something the characters too should be able to do as well!! The actor playing Bower was so amazing that I didn’t notice that it was clear to me that these monsters were mutated people! All I knew was that in such a disoriented and hopeless state, I could totally understand that level of ignorance.

    (SPOILER ALERT – key ending details below! read no further to avoid knowing too much about the end!)
    Finally, the big ‘reveal’ at the end should, as you say, change how you thought about what came before. In amazing films (Sixth Sense, American Psycho) you are completely thrown off balance and find yourself opened up to great new ideas! In pretty good films – and Pandorum is a pretty good film – one comes away having sensed what the end might be ahead of time, but wondering why that ending still felt unsettling. For example, in light of what happened in 800 years on that ship, why am I not completely excited for those people to bring a similar evolutionary trajectory to the new planet? Should humanity have made it? I find myself confused by the sameness of our imaginations in films like this – why do we always see ourselves this way, but still want the hopeful ending?

    No, its not a perfect film, but by and large it was very entertaining and thought provoking if you imagine yourself as these few survivors!

  10. The movie bothered me a lot because it seemed awfully familiar. Then it hit me. Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow – an absurd movie best not taken seriously which somehow got Gwyneth Paltrow, Jude Law, and Angelina Jolie to “star” in.

    Yet it was remade as Pandorum, except with mutants instead of flying robots.

    That final scene where people are popping up all over the place on escape pods? Straight out of the Sky Captain movie.

  11. I thought this movie was very good, but that is only my opinion i suppose, but then again i like quite a bit of movies alot of the people around me dislike.

  12. it would of been better if they showed how the people turned into the monsters i meen u dont turn into somthing that looks like it came from hell and fell down the ugl tree and hit al the branches just randomely meen come on

  13. well i think it was an excellent movie the whole time got me wondering how the hell the earth… not spoiling anything yet, and for those who did a bad review i think it’s because they didn’t get any of the movie at all!! you better watch it 2 or maybe 3 times more hahaha, for all of those sci-fi junkies these would be a classic oh and by the way drag me to hell really really not good!!

  14. It was a very good movie. Original story, very well conceived spaceship interior and very detailed exterior shots, backstory, hot looking fighting babe; I thought it was really , really good. Forget what the critics say, talk to your friends and see if for yourself!

  15. I loved this movie.I thought it was one of the best films of the year. Not only was it intense and mysterious, but the acting in this film was very convincing. While its true that there is no mystery around the monsters, everything else has a very mysterious element to it. There are quite a few twists and turns. The fact that no one on the ship can remember anything brings so many questions to the film. The movie really makes you root for the main character, and this is one of the few movies this year to succeed in doing so. I especially loved the ending of this film and what they did with Lt. Payton. So good.

  16. This film was suprisingly better than I thought. There were some geniune moments of Claustrophobia. Of the two sci-fi flicks out right now (Surrogates), Pandorum was much better. It is a like dead space as well as a little Event Horizon, Aliens and Dawn of the Dead. I think Dennis Quaid was the worst part of the movie. His acting has gotten worse with time, he was horrible in GI JOE. Can your acting chops get worse with time?

  17. Thought it was fantastic. It’s my in my top 5 favorites this year. If anyone cares, that’d be:

    1) Drag Me to Hell
    2) Inglorious Basterds
    3) Pandorum
    4) Sorority Row
    5) Halloween 2

    Alright, alright, I’ll admit it. I’m a total horror junkie. I’m the weirdo who preferred Sorority Row to Star Trek. I now realize my opinion is forfeit. Sorry guys :P

    1. Ummm… Yeah.

      I do believe that #’s 1, 3, and 4 may be on most critics WORST of 2009 List.

      But, i have just re-read your post and you do say your “top 5 FAVORITES this year”, not top 5 Best Films… So, fair enough.

    2. well, i havent seen 4 out of 5 of those movies, but Halloween 2 was by far one of the worst movies ive ever seen ….EVER.
      but i am totes a horror movie junkie and thought jennifers body wasnt to bad. horror movies are rarely good, so appreciate what you get, rite?

  18. I really don’t agree >.<…Sorry.

    I really enjoyed the film and so did everyone I went to see it with. It was interesting and scary at times and I really liked the ending and how the movie implied that, that was the way humans got to Earth…I really dug that idea.
    I also think the whole idea that the people on the ship evolved into those monsters because they evolved to the life of living on a dark secluded ship is brilliant…

    But I guess to each their own :P

  19. FUCK!!!!! i was relly relly exsited about this project. then i hear its by the guys of the resident evil films and now a fuck load of bad reviews. theres no point ):

    1. Just watched the movie last night with my boyfriend. We love sci-fi/horror. It actually is very scary, reminded me of the game deadspace to a degree.

      It’s obviously a lower budget film as it was never released nation-wide to theaters, and yet it’s way better than dumb movies like Paranormal Activity which I thought was a JOKE.

      It’s very “creepy” — is the word for it, and has some new talent actors which I thought were very good. And I love Dennis Quaid, but he’s actually a secondary character in this movie. =) It’s much better than the RE movies, too. Monsters were a hundred times better than the stupid crap monsters that most films churn out, such as Quarantine (another movie I thought was a joke.)

      I would def check it out.. if you have netflix you can order it. Of course if you’ve read the spoilers here it won’t be as good. :P And no, it isn’t that obvious where the monsters came from (but I didn’t see the trailer?). Considering they’re in space, the monsters could have been from anywhere – alien squatters, etc. Give it a try, you should judge for yourself and not go by cynical critics who are a dime a dozen on these review websites.

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