From the master of technophobic paranoiac pseudoscience fiction, Michael Crichton, comes this tense, well-made suspense thriller. Anybody interested in AI, robotics and cybernetics will have a difficult time suspending disbelief as Selleck is forced to fight off a few battalions of homicidal gadgets under the influence of a mod chip programmed to identify specific human targets, with all of the cyber-evil ultimately under the control none other than Kiss lead singer Gene Simmons. If this sounds ridiculous, please understand that this film is not above a little self-deprecating geek humor - for example after the first action sequence, where Selleck has chased down a runaway farm implement, he refers to the CPU of the unit as an old 8088. OK, if you got this joke, you might appreciate the rest of the film's comic relief. If not, you should enjoy it for its solidly entertaining suspense.
The soundtrack (Jerry Goldsmith) often hurts, but has a few good moments. Some of Gary Numan's darker and weirder stuff from around the time this film was released might have been a better choice, or perhaps even Jean Michel Jarre.
Tom Selleck does well in his physically and emotionally demanding role, playing a police officer with vertigo who is assigned to disable runaway robots. To his credit, none of Crichton's robots are the standard ludicrous anthropomorphisms we see in schlock-fests like I Robot and The Clown Wars, but rather mechanical hardware things as innocuous as boxy agricultural drones which pick bugs from cornstalks and turn them into fertilizer and housekeeping automatons which look only slightly more advanced than today's robotic vacuums.
Cynthia Rhodes steals this show. Her performance is so spot-on that I was compelled to look her up here immediately after seeing this movie for the second time. See for yourself: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0722407/ I am astonished and intrigued by her extremely low profile. Please e-mail me if you have an explanation for this!
Gene Simmons is about what you would expect, he delivers his lines with little tangible feeling, overacts frequently, and does well with looking weird and menacing, but has little sense of pace or complex facial expression. Kirstie Allie gives a fairly standard performance, and Chris Mulkey, not unusually, puts in a very nice effort for his relatively minor role. The rest of the cast is quite good.
I'm not a big fan of more recent Crichton films, but I really enjoy his earlier works, especially Andromeda Strain and this film. I remembered seeing this about twenty years ago and being pleasantly surprised. My second viewing, just an hour ago, was just as entertaining. Sure the soundtrack, hairstyles and some of the dialog are outdated, but the themes, characters, and even the plot are not.
The soundtrack (Jerry Goldsmith) often hurts, but has a few good moments. Some of Gary Numan's darker and weirder stuff from around the time this film was released might have been a better choice, or perhaps even Jean Michel Jarre.
Tom Selleck does well in his physically and emotionally demanding role, playing a police officer with vertigo who is assigned to disable runaway robots. To his credit, none of Crichton's robots are the standard ludicrous anthropomorphisms we see in schlock-fests like I Robot and The Clown Wars, but rather mechanical hardware things as innocuous as boxy agricultural drones which pick bugs from cornstalks and turn them into fertilizer and housekeeping automatons which look only slightly more advanced than today's robotic vacuums.
Cynthia Rhodes steals this show. Her performance is so spot-on that I was compelled to look her up here immediately after seeing this movie for the second time. See for yourself: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0722407/ I am astonished and intrigued by her extremely low profile. Please e-mail me if you have an explanation for this!
Gene Simmons is about what you would expect, he delivers his lines with little tangible feeling, overacts frequently, and does well with looking weird and menacing, but has little sense of pace or complex facial expression. Kirstie Allie gives a fairly standard performance, and Chris Mulkey, not unusually, puts in a very nice effort for his relatively minor role. The rest of the cast is quite good.
I'm not a big fan of more recent Crichton films, but I really enjoy his earlier works, especially Andromeda Strain and this film. I remembered seeing this about twenty years ago and being pleasantly surprised. My second viewing, just an hour ago, was just as entertaining. Sure the soundtrack, hairstyles and some of the dialog are outdated, but the themes, characters, and even the plot are not.