Subject: Review: Deep Impact (1998)

From: [email-masked] (Ulrich Schreglmann)
Date: 11 Jun 1998 04:42:07 GMT

REVIEW: "Deep Impact" (1998) (spoilers)

Beware of movies containing sound in space while at the same time claiming
they're "realistic."  When the spaceship, meant to blow up the Big Bad Comet
headed for Earth, takes off with with a supersonic bang reminiscent of the
Enterprise going to Warp Speed, well, that was the moment the
"ShYeahRight!"-level reached my consciousness threshold.  It should have done
so a lot sooner, what with its not just being the technical details that lack
plausibility.  But I guess I'm more of a technology pedant than a
psychologist.

OK, to get this straight right away:  Deep Impact is a BAD movie.  It's a
screwed up movie about a subject of great potential.  And whenever I see a
film of that kind I try to remember all the big and little things that struck
me as bad, thinking of ways it could have been done better.  (However, after
a few paragraphs I'll just resort to bitching.)

It's a matter of fact a comet could be on a collision course towards Earth
right now, and it might be detected late--maybe even too late to do anything
about it.  (Improbable it may be, yet not impossible.)	It is also a fact
that most comets are discovered by hobby astronomers, because the big
telescopes, while being able to magnify single spots in the heavens
enormously, are pityfully inept when it comes to surveying the starscape as a
whole.	So the first scene, in which a boy in high school astronomy class
finds an uncharted spot in the skies can fill you, quite convincingly, with a
sense of dread, knowing what the movie will be about.

Cut to next scene, the photo with the spot that shouldn't be there is sent to
a professional astronomer, who, after only a few seconds of computer
wizardry, determines the snowball will hit Earth right smack in the middle. 
(We all know how fast astronomers can make such accurate predictions from the
the last comet scare we had.  "Oh, it'll come so close it might actually
graze the moon--whoops, sorry, must have gotten a floating point wrong
there.")  Anyway, the comet is scheduled for the great get-together at least
two years from then, but the astronomer has to race down the mountain in
order to tell the world right that night, risking life and limb--and duly
losing it.

Actually that scene might have worked just as well as the first one, like
this: Comet is discovered by accident, well in time to warn mankind, but a
single cigarette butt falling into the lap of the oncoming truck driver is
responsible for precious possible months of preparations lost.	And a simple
frown of concern on the astronomers face would have sufficed, instead of that
silly panic attack we all know astronomers get.  (From the movie Contact we
know they always have to go somewhere really fast by car when that happens.) 
Later we find out the accident isn't even much of a delay--that authorities
were informed at the time, possibly thanks to documents left at the
observatory.  So what was the point of the astronomer's death?	Something
like, "ooh, the comet has claimed its first victim?"  (Maybe that's the
astrological point of view, I don't know.)

I have a deep suspicion the astronomer's death was originally intended
exactly as described above by me, but then some dolt rewrote the script, left
the death in, left it's point out.

Cut to a TV reporter who, while investigating an alleged political sex
scandal, stumbles over the government's secret plans involving their
knowledge about the comet and preparations to deflect it.  Well, this cliche
movie including a ficticious President of the United States wouldn't be out
of the Clinton term of office period if it didn't try to clumsily nudge into
some real life popular political affair.  (Makes you see the intern scandal
with whole new eyes, doesn't it?  Ooh!	Well, everyone who reads the right
tabloids probably knew all along outer space and some conspiracy is
involved.)

The President was about to go public anyway, because the national budget
report is due, and it turns out they have spent quite a bundle on a big
spaceship (the one that goes boom supersonically, in space) meant to
transport thermonuclear bombs to the comet, thus blowing it into smaller bits
that aren't on a collision course.

Here we have a variation of the old James Bond cliche, "rich
villain/government organization builds a supersecret super-expensive base for
some supersecret super-expensive super-important plan."  The incompatible
keywords are, of course, "supersecret" and "super-expensive."  If that were
the real world the problem wouldn't be hiding the imbalance on your bank
account.  The problem would be simply this:  The money is used to buy the
goods and services of thousands of people, to build a space
station/spaceship.  Raising no suspicions in any of them and keeping all
those in the loop quiet, especially about approaching Armageddon, in our
information age where all it might take is a qualified post into
sci.astronomy to make someone look at a certain spot in the sky more closely.
 OK, if that movie were James Bond level I wouldn't mind.  But it IS boasting
realism!

Anyway, the supersecret, super-expensive spaceship takes off (with a
supersonic boom).  They obviously spent so much on the spaceship they even
invented artificial gravity somewhere on the way.  (It's the inevitable step,
right after Teflon.)  I can't remember the astronauts doing a lot of floating
around.  They even sleep in bunks lying down, not floating in sleeping bags
the way you see real ones do in documentaries on Space Night.  Maybe the ship
just accelerates all the time.	But in that case the crew would have lived in
a tower, connected by stairs and ladders, not a long, flat corridor.

The spaceship (which makes noise in space--have I mentioned that yet?) is
powered by some prototype kind of nuclear acceleration.  That's without a
doubt what I would use in order to make sure mankind's last hope definitely
reaches their destination--some never before used nuclear propellant.

I can't make any educated guesses on how dangerous the sunny side of a comet
is to an astronaut happening to stroll across it.  My UNeducated guess, which
I reach by extrapolating about the movie's "realism" so far, is: it was
exaggerated in a sensationalist manner.  (If anyone knows better, feel free
to correct me.	I'm sure there have been some discussions about the movie's
realism already.  I haven't read them yet, but I think I will.	My critique
is from the point of view of common knowledge.)

The crew tries to dig a nuke far into the comet's night side before it turns
to face the sun.  They run late, the sun goes up, pockets of steam start
exploding around them, shooting chunks of ice and one unfortunate astronaut
into deep space.  (Whew!  More drama!)	I wonder how probable it is the
comet's rotational axis is parallel to its orbital axis.  Because if it
weren't there ought to be a polar region on it that is constantly in the
dark.  (OK, the pole wouldn't be the point of preference from where to blow a
chip off.  You'd be a fool if you didn't use the centrifugal forces in order
to bifurcate the trajectories of the resulting pieces even faster.  But you'd
have all the time in the world to drill from there.)

Anyway, the timing of the explosion was obviously off.	The spacial iceberg
breaks apart, but both pieces are still going to hit Earth.  The ship hasn't
any more propellant for a second run, instead they follow the harbinger of
doom home.

At home plans are under way to save a portion of mankind Dr. Strangelove
style, in huge artificial caves.  Later we learn most of the devastation will
be a result of dust from the impact darkening Earth for two years, killing
all plantlife.	So what's the point of digging yourself in?  Wouldn't that
effort have been spent better on producing large numbers of greenhouses,
ultraviolet light bulbs to shine in them and additional power plants to
provide them with energy?  It's not like you're forced to shield yourself
from radiation, as in a NUCLEAR winter.

A last effort to destroy the comets with tactical nuclear missiles from Earth
fails.	(Maybe by now the winter WOULD become nuclear.)  The smaller comet's
impact in the Atlantic Ocean is imminent; the president advises people to
evacuate the coastal areas.  Oh, great, NOW he tells them.  (And apparently
no one else who knew the point of impact in case they failed cared to inform
East Coast residents in time, either, so highways wouldn't be congested.) 
The small comet hits and the Tsunami reaches as far as Washington DC.  If to
see the devastation of New York City is what you have come for, this is your
moment.

Well, one thing at least you can rely on.  If a movie is as cheesy up to this
point it has to have a happy ending.  The astronauts, limping alongside,
discover a pocket has formed in the large comet.  They manage to fly in,
explode their remaining nukes inside, blowing the large comet to smithereens
while also sacrificing themselves.  If I managed to suspend my disbelief this
far--well, why not.  I'm too tired too still worry about plausibility at this
point.	Maybe it's realistic, maybe it isn't, who cares.  The President makes
an encouraging speech in front of the ruins of the Capitol, already in a
stage of reconstruction.  The End.

This review was mainly about the science aspects of this "realistic" movie. 
I could write a critique just as flattering and of this length about the
so-called "character developments."  But I won't.  Suffice it to say, if you
want to see the worthwhile bits, sneak in towards the end, see New York
destroyed, then go see Mister Magoo or The Rainmaker or whatever else it is
that runs in your local theater at the time.  (This review was written in
Germany.  We're behind.)

Ool.
mailto:[email-masked]
http://www.forwiss.de/~uhschreg/
"There's nothing good--unless you do't" (German saying, stupid translation)

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