Subject: Review: Lost in Space (1998)

From: Chuck Dowling <[email-masked]>
Date: 11 Oct 1998 19:28:35 GMT

Lost in Space (1998)

**1/2 out of *****

Cast: Gary Oldman, William Hurt, Matt LeBlanc, Mimi Rogers, Heather
Graham, Lacey Chabert, Jack Johnson, and cameos from some of the stars
of the TV series.
Written by: Akiva Goldsman
Directed by: Stephen Hopkins
Running Time: 130 minutes

Akiva Goldsman, the writer and producer of Lost in Space is the same
person who joined forces with that hideous monster Joel Schumacher to
help obliterate the Batman franchise. Now Goldsman has left Schumacher
behind, looking to destroy some other beloved series. Thankfully, he
picked one that wasn't so established to begin with.

I remember watching the TV series Lost in Space as a kid. It was a
fairly entertaining show as far as cheesy sci-fi goes, but I haven't
seen a frame of it since I was oh, six years old. So the fact that
it's based on something I watched as a kid had no influence on my
opinion whatsoever. It holds no special place in my heart or anything
like that.

The year is 2058. Earth has almost exhausted all of it's natural
resources and now the Robinson family, led by brilliant scientist John
Robinson (William Hurt), venture out into the galaxy to find new
resources for our planet. Now two things: this is only 60 years in the
future? Goldsman's a little too ambitious there if you ask me. We
can't even control a remote-controlled car on Mars for more than two
days. We're supposed to be space travelling to the farthest reaches of
the galaxy with ease in the next 60 years? And also, you want to know
why our natural resources are almost exhausted? Look no farther than
all the spaceship cars and orbiting space stations we've built. So
humans have used up all of our natural resources to build ships to
help us look for more natural resources? Anyway, it seems we're in
some sort of civil war with ourselves over the space exploration
stuff.

A faction of terrorists hope to sabotage the mission by destroying the
Robinson family and their spacecraft. The evil Dr. Smith (Gary Oldman,
in full bad guy mode) sneaks on board to do just that, but is knocked
unconscious before the launch. The ship launches, mayhem ensues, and
to make a long story short... Dr. Smith, the Robinson family, and
their pilot Major Don West (Matt LeBlanc) end up millions of miles
from home. Now they're lost in space, get it?

What's fun about Lost in Space is seeing how many plots from other
(and better) sci-fi movies and TV shows you can spot.  Look, it's the
crash of the Enterprise from Star Trek:Generations! Now it's the Death
Star battle scene from Return of the Jedi! Now it's The Black Hole!
Now it's Star Trek:The Motion Picture!  Now it's... well you get the
idea. Actually most of the second half of the film is nothing but a
redressed version of the second half of Star Trek:Generations. There's
hardly one original concept in the whole picture.

Goldsman has unfortunately brought along his trusty one-liner book,
and it's amazing that he had any left over after "Batman and
Robin". And I can't say this enough... I hate one-liners! What makes
it even worse is that, the characters are using puns and phrases from
NOW, surely by 2058 they'd be considered obsolete. If a teenager today
was saying lines from the 1930s like "She's the cat's meow" or
"23-skidoo" they'd be beaten to a bloody pulp.

Watching "Lost in Space" is a lot like watching the film portions of
some big interactive ride at Epcot or Universal Studios. If I was six
years old again, I'm sure that I'd think the new version of Lost in
Space was great stuff. And six year olds seem to be it's target
audience, what with the silly brother-sister spats and cute little
aliens and all. It's a marketing bonanza, with action figures and
Happy Meals clearly right around the corner.

The performances by the men in the film are good, but the female
characters are all sadly wasted. And the youngest daughter Penny
(Lacey Chabert) makes me uncomfortable because I'm not sure what to
say about her. She could either be six years old or eighteen years
old. The effects are good for the most part, although a couple do look
really phony and therefore unconvincing. The best thing about the
whole film is what we're treated to as the closing credits roll. We
get a techno version of the old TV show's theme. That almost made it
all worthwhile. Almost.  [PG-13]

The Jacksonville Film Journal -- Film Reviews by Chuck Dowling
URL: http://users.southeast.net/~chuckd21/
Email: [email-masked]

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