The Day the Earth Stopped (2008) Reviews

• Terrible Movie, Don't bother.

  HoPeFuLLL2008-12-12

  Terrible, terrible, what were they thinking? Bad Acting. Bad Directing. Bad Story Line or Script. Made me wonder if they get someone to watch what they've made prior to releasing a movie. I actually sat through nearly half this movie for a laugh, then I just fast forwarded in big chunks. Oh, we two Aliens, we wont let them talk to anyone important and we'll keep them in an old abandoned warehouse and let a low ranking officer beat them up a bit. First 2 minutes of the film look promising, don't let it fool you. Nothing good about this movie sorry. Did I mention this was terrible?

• Well, I've seen students do better work

  hell-on-toast2008-12-12

  Within the first ten minutes I was thinking hard about if this was a very elaborate Youtube spoof or a serious film. The acting is so undeniably awful it makes you cringe. The camera work is cheap and amateur while the sound and lighting could be done by an undergrad making their first drama. You think I'm joking? Look for the massively over exposed shot at 00:09:98. It just gets worse from here. Very low budget, poorly written and astounding that it made it this far. There is a weird mix between shots that blew the budget and money saving stuff that makes things look just plain nasty. How many times have you seen a government agent jumping from an expensive black truck only to start setting up a fold out table for his equipment? Mix this with cheap CGI and you have an instant looser. Should have been killed in pre-production. Watch if you want to know how not to make a feature film. *shakes head*

• How bad can a bad movie be?

  kilkul2008-12-12

  I've seen some bad movies in my days. I'm also quite a big sci-fi fan, so my tolerance level was high enough. But this is one of those movies I really DISCOURAGE people to watch. The performances are lame, the storyline is ancient history, the sets are lame, and, except SOME computer graphics, the movie is just pure crap. Everything is big and shiny (the cars, the actors), but I can't shake the feeling of a high-school medium-grade film project. Why do directors, producers, etc., feel the need to create such junk? I would REALLY love to see less (if any) such "movies"... Just donate the money to less fortunate children or throw a party or something, but stop wasting people lives and nerves!

• A not very good Sci-Fi flick

  JRmf2008-12-14

  As a SF freak, I'd have to admit the best I could say about this movie is that it had its (brief) moments, and showed promise, but failed miserably to deliver. An armada of 666(!) giant robots arrive on Earth and position themselves in capital cities worldwide. Apparently they are the executors of Earth's death sentence - they are somehow slowing down the Earth's core and that will mean FINIS by sunset. Something to do with tilting its axis but otherwise never discussed, elaborated or otherwise given any credence. Along with the robots comes a Woman and a Man, who show up wandering naked in the woods. The Woman is "The Destroyer", though why is never elaborated. The Man's role is never described but presumably he supplements the Woman somehow. They both can manifest awesome force-projection powers (enough to knock a squad of soldiers off its feet) but nevertheless are easily tranquilized and kept captive, sedated etc. The people of Earth have been judged and found wanting as too destructive. But if they can show their "humanity" to the Woman, they might be saved. It's left to Myron (Howell), who forms a bond with the Woman, to do this, incidentally through helping a woman in childbirth. The Woman says she can't intervene in human affairs but does so to save the woman who has just given birth. In the end it's this action/these events which seems to convince Her that humanity contains some value and should be spared (whatever..) SFX are not bad, unlike the rest of the movie. When the robot armada arrives, there's no warning. No radar centers plotting their arrival, or crowds gawking at the spectacle (the robots are some 20 stories high). It's just PLONK and they're there. Even with a small budget, a lot can be done if there's careful thought, which is sadly lacking here. The "command center" (on which the destiny of the world hangs) particularly grated. It's a dingy room with a few even dingier benches on which sit a few PCs with CRT ("fat") monitors, with a kid's telescope on some filing cabinets in the background along with a few arc lights, for good measure. Blueprints are several times rolled out - I am no architect but I'm pretty sure they went out with slide rules in the 70's. Character development is sketchy and unconvincing at best, or simply non-existent. Only Myron's approaches acceptability. The 5 min end-credits roll in ultra slow motion, with a big "The Day The Earth Stopped" occupying the last 30 secs, to conceal the fact that there simply isn't much to show as to what went into the film's production. One can only assume this movie was timed to release at the same time as, and capitalize on, "The Day The Earth Stood Still". I for one was sucked in. But frankly I would be embarrassed to watch it in the presence of non-SFers who had any sort of discernment at all. A very generous 3/10

• Horrible in practically every way

  bwdude2008-12-15

  Blinded by the (formerly) not so bad rating, I decided to give it a chance. At least it could have been some nice foreplay until "the one" with Keanu comes out. (pun intended) But it wasn't. Where do I start ... bad BAD acting of almost everybody in the movie. Especially bad editing, sometimes there are cuts that have absolutely nothing to do with the current scene. Like near the beginning when you hear two people talking and at the same time see shots of people working silently on their computers. And don't get me started on the script. Then there's the "logic factor" once again. 666 giant robots are landing on major cities on earth, yet there are NO people on the streets, no hysteria, not even simple curiosity. Everybody is rather calm, like this would happen every day. It's like we (the unfortunate viewers of the movie) get to see them, but nobody else, apart from the principal actors. Like other people already mentioned, the superior aliens (in human form) are landing on earth. They have great powers and great knowledge. But a simple sedative knocks them out and an even simpler cell can hold them? In general this *could* have been a nice variation on the original theme, that's why I gave it two instead of one points. It may have been due to budget restrictions, or that they wanted to kick it out before the Keanu-movie. Either way, it did not do it any good. As I said in the title: It's horrible in practically every way, don't waste your time on it. Watch the original or wait for Keanu.