The Apocalypse (1997)

Overrated and overhyped

Absolutely the worst movie.

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

I don't know what just happened to me. Sandra Bernhard was fighting David Crosby while the little hooker friend from Pretty Woman was performing "Scenes From Shakespeare." You read that right. It's a good thing that the MPAA does not enact capital punishment, because everyone involved would have been strung up as examples to aspiring actors, writers and directors with more enthusiasm than talent. Painful. Pro tip: adding (AND ENDLESSLY REPEATING THE SAME) lines from Shakespeare does not make your movie good; it actually highlights how crummy the movie is. The writing was puerile, the acting was a visual Columbine, and the plot couldn't make it. Not all of the cats in the world could have made this movie enjoyable or even watchable. If faced with the dilemma of watching this movie or...doing anything else, I can strongly and authoritatively recommend anything else.

This movie is not as bad as it may seem at first. The screenplay is ludicrous sometimes, but the actors save the day: Sandra Bernhard plays the captain of a spaceship who hates the rest of the world and spends her time off in bars, kicking some teeth in. Tougher than Ripley ("Alien"), less scrupulous than Han Solo ("Star Wars"). Frank Zagarino is an intense villain who gets plenty of opportunity to hurt and kill people. And Laura San Giacomo I remember from "Quigley" is amazing as the crazy programmer using Shakespeare quotes for passwords.Talking about quotes, here's my favorite line from the movie (re-translated from German dubbed version, so maybe not exactly the same words): "There's no danger our ship could be hit by a meteor. It is too big." Say you love logical thinking.Anyway, I found this quite entertaining despite several flaws in the story (voted 5/10). The worst one: we are not told what became of the programmer, she just disappears from the spaceship. One little correction: the cargo on board threatening to destroy the Earth is not nuclear warheads as mentioned in the plot outline, it's an element named "Solarium" that will blow up when staying too long in a magnetic field.

This film could have been interesting, but it wasn't. The thing that seemed most odd about this film was that a few times during the movie, the group started fighting with the guy who was trying to figure out the puzzles and save the ship. I suppose they figured that if he was beat senseless he could solve the problems more efficiently. Anyway, I try to find some reason to see a movie in most of my reviews, so you might consider this movie if you're interested in weird uses of Shakespeare.

This picture is nowhere near as rancid as "Space Mutiny", which will cause psychological damage without the superb MST3K treatment, but "The Apocalypse" can have effects with apocalyptic results on the human psyche. I was actually able to tolerate the entire movie. It's something I would not want to watch again unless I wanted to give myself an excuse to commit suicide. I even actually own the movie on LaserDisc! But, it's a great deal, considering that it was given to me, or would that be a curse? The acting is just terrible, with parts either overdone, or simply bland. The props is what you'd expect from a low budget production, with stuff that looks like it was assembled with packing materials and done in a warehouse, looking worse than a high school production of "The Technicolor Dreamcoat". The video monitor displays were obviously VHS videotape, since one of the special effect for those displays was just simply visual searching back and forth throughout the scenes, with parts of the video sequences showing dropouts, probably because the tape was being worn out through excessive use during production. The music will make you want to plug your ears in pain as it makes the Macarena sound like a masterpiece. The visual effects? What visual effects? I've seen better visuals on a "Three Stooges" skit. It amazes me how the company that was responsible for the production actually had enough money left over to distribute this garbage, even on LaserDisc of all things. A DVD version is also a waste of material. The videotape version would be best, since you probably will be able to celebrate when the VCR decides to eat it. This is a production where the source material deserves to be locked in a vault and left to rot, fade, and be eaten by fungus and mold. - Reinhart