Evolution (2001)

hyped garbage

Very interesting film. Was caught on the premise when seeing the trailer but unsure as to what the outcome would be for the showing. As it turns out, it was a very good film.

Blistering performances.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

Campy. But in a 90s way. Not intentionally so, but the stink of the 90s all over it. We looked it up. After 9/11? Uncomfortably close. Duchovny is not mulder, but he is. Plot doesn't matter. Creature movies are good. Scifi movies, where the scary thing is an oversimplification of one reasonably interesting scientific concept, are good. What if the monster kept evolving? Became a microcosm of evolutionary process. That movie needed to be made. It probably already had been.Is it a comedy? Well, yes. It is comedic. But it's like some characters are in a different movie than others. Like a slapstick and a procedural, side by side. Uneasy balance. The mood shifts.Essentially a demo reel for what range of bio monsters you could make with CGI in the early aughts. Looks like a video game, now. This movie tries some weird things, at least. It's pretty dumb, though.

And that's it. They pay for it and they own it. Maybe funny, but not enough. Shame. Good cast, though. And that's it. They pay for it and they own it. Maybe funny, but not enough. Shame. Good cast, though. And that's it. They pay for it and they own it. Maybe funny, but not enough. Shame. Good cast, though. And that's it. They pay for it and they own it. Maybe funny, but not enough. Shame. Good cast, though.

Going in, if you watched a trailer or were aware of the cast or story, you would already know that it is far from a serious tone aside from knowing it is a comedy. While I would definitely label it what I call "stupid humor", I enjoyed it for what it was worth... Orlando Jones is by far my favorite part of the movie. Everything he says is comedic, even when it is purposefully meant to be funny or just straight shot. Some of his lines delivered made me laugh out loud when I was younger and even more so as I am older... At a younger age, I can clearly remember not being so critical of actors/actresses but now, quite the opposite, and I stand at an agreement as I always have been on Sean William Scott. He always plays the same character and has always gotten a simple pity laugh out of me as he always has. I can say I have only enjoyed him in 'The Rundown' but the constant stays true; he is the same character, different film.Overall, ignoring a comical dumb plot and some forced "realizations" throughout the movie. 'Evolution' is still an entertaining flick for me to sit down and just turn off my mind too. Pure stupid entertainment and fun. Nothing special to go crazy for. Still an old favorite of mine.

Goofy sci-fi spoof set in an Arizona community college desert town has two scientists (David Duchovny and Orlando Bloom) discovering a variety of alien lifeforms evolving into scary monsters at an alarming rate, deciding it would be best to kill them before the extinction of the human race. How to do that? Head and Shoulders shampoo, of course! Duchovny gets to riff his X-Files image and is comfortably relaxed as a ladies' man with a rather unfortunate history regarding his work at the Pentagon…which a former associate, General Woodman (Ted Levine; Silence of the Lambs, Monk), likes to remind him of. Bloom coaches girl basketball, must endure a rectal removal of an alien "fly", and seems to be having fun as Duchovny's wise-cracking sidekick…certainly hard to forget is how Bloom is literally sucked into the anus of a giant alien monster! Seann William Scott, obviously cast due to his Stiffler character from the American Pie movies of the time, is a fireman wannabe who assists the scientists in trying to stop the aliens from evolving into a menace that would destroy all of mankind. Julianne Moore is another military scientist that eventually sides with Duchovny and Bloom after initially being on the side of Levine. Dan Aykroyd is the Arizona governor and Sarah Silverman is a former lover of Duchovny's. As you might expect, Moore and Duchovny (Moore being a redhead has a special irony to it, considering Gillian Anderson was opposite Duchovny on the X-Files) eventually hit it off. The obvious ending Ghost Busters homage is hard not to notice. Some cool special effects giving life to the aliens add substantially to the spoof; this might make a fun companion piece to Mars Attacks. The comedy aims to please and perhaps tries just a bit too hard, but I guess it succeeds more than fails. I thought William Scott was rather inconsequential to the film, lightening up his usual shtick and offering a rather dimbulb bimbo who is all gung-ho to help the scientists. A type of winged dinosaur flying through a mall could be the special effects highlight, but there is an underground cavern that becomes its own alien world which gives it a run for its money. Moore was about to move on from this kind of movie to focus on far more dramatic work. Bloom's asking for his leg to be removed before the fly inside his body reaches his testicles should get a good laugh. There's plenty of winking in Duchovny's performance which signifies that he (nor us should) doesn't take this seriously at all.