Rating of
2.5/4
"Sunshine" by Yojimbo
Yojimbo - wrote on 04/29/12
Danny Boyle's latest sees the crew of the Icarus 2 delivering a nuclear device to try and restart our dying sun. The concept is a kind of grown up (well, young adult) version of Armageddon, for the first hour it has a striking resemblance to 2010, and for the final third it shifts gear and becomes a spacebound slasher flick in a similar vein to Event Horizon. The cast is certainly above par for this kind of hokey sci-fi, but I couldn't shake the feeling I'd come in half way through; there is little build up, and the script spends all it's time manufacturing drama full of races against time giving the audience little time to get to know the characters. This makes it very difficult to care when they make their inevitable and noble self sacrifices. It has some very pretty imagery, but Boyle's insistence on using almost constant visual distortions towards the end began to wear on my nerves, and Underworld's score is dated and intrusive. It's unusual and well made enough to maintain interest for it's duration, but it's flaws combined with some serious lapses in logic in the plot, particularly in the rather nonsensical ending make it more of a rental film than a purchase.
