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Red Planet (film)

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Red Planet
Theatrical release poster
Directed byAntony Hoffman
Written byChuck Pfarrer
Jonathan Lemkin
Produced byBruce Berman
Mark Canton
StarringVal Kilmer
Carrie-Anne Moss
Tom Sizemore
Benjamin Bratt
Simon Baker
Terence Stamp
CinematographyPeter Suschitzky
Edited byRobert K. Lambert
Dallas Puett
Music byGraeme Revell
Production
company
Distributed byWarner Bros.
Release date
  • November 10, 2000 (2000-11-10)
Running time
106 minutes
CountriesUnited States
Australia
LanguageEnglish
Budget$70 million (estimated)
Box office$33,463,969 (box office), $22,700,000 (rentals in USA)[1]

Red Planet (originally entitled Alone[2]) is a 2000 American-Australian-Jordanian science fiction thriller film. Set in the near future, the film follows the events of the disaster-laden first manned mission to the planet Mars. The directional debut (and to to date, only film) directed by Antony Hoffman, the film stars Val Kilmer, Carrie-Anne Moss and Tom Sizemore.

Red Planet was a box office bomb, was noted for it's many scientific inaccuracies, and polarized critics. The film nonetheless did receive some positive reviews and fared better on home video.

Production

Pre-production and effects

The working title of the film in Australia was "Alone"; in the US it was simply "Mars". The film was altered to Red Planet to avoid confusion with other films coming out at the same time which were set on Mars, such as Mission to Mars and Ghosts of Mars.[3] The film was produced by Village Roadshow Pictures and distributed by Warner Bros. Dozens of companies were involved in the special effects[4], which pushed back post-production by almost a year[5] and raised the budget by many millions.[6]

Filming

Filming took place from 30 August 1999 to 24 December 1999.[7] In-studio, Red Planet was filmed in Sydney, Australia. Some of the Martian outdoor scenes were filmed in the desert around Coober Pedy in South Australia. Some scenes were filmed in the "Brickpit", a former quarry in the Sydney Olympic Park in Homebush Bay; the same location for the eponymous Thunderdome in Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome.[8] Some of the more impressive outdoor scenes, such as the Martian canyons, were filmed on-location in the Wadi Rum valley in the Middle Eastern country of Jordan.[9][10]

Val Kilmer and Tom Sizemore began feuding during production. According to reports, it all began when Kilmer got annoyed about a fancy exercise machine that Sizemore wanted shipped from England to the set in Australia. Eventually the two hated each other so much Kilmer would not come out of his trailer if Sizemore was on the set. Many of their scenes together were filmed over shoulders of photo doubles. Kilmer reportedly refused to say Sizemore's character's name, saying instead "Hey, you!"[11]

Movie connections and references

The film makes references to 2001: A Space Odyssey (in the name of the commanders), with nods to Red Planet Mars, The Angry Red Planet, Chinatown, and Apollo 13. Red Planet has also been referenced in numerous other media.[12]

Taglines

  • Not A Sound. Not A Warning. Not A Chance. Not Alone.
  • The Color Of Fear.
  • They Didn't Find Life On Mars. It Found Them.[13]

Plot

Setting

In 2056 AD, Earth is in ecologic crisis as a consequence of pollution and overpopulation and much wildlife, such as frogs, have become extinct. Automated interplanetary missions have been seeding Mars with bio-engineered, atmosphere-producing algae as the first stage of the terraforming of Mars; the ultimate goal of the project is the settlement of the Red Planet to ease the burden on mankind's homeworld and give us a second chance with a new home. The algae initially took hold, turning the red color of the planet to a vibrant green, thickening the atmosphere of Mars and producing oxygen. However, the undertaking suffers catastrophic failure when the algae inexplicably disappears, and the oxygen levels begin to fluctuate from dangerously high to dangerously low.

The crew of the UISA Mars I, the most advanced spacecraft ever built, is launched from low Earth orbit to investigate what is happening to the terraforming project; the first manned mission to Mars. The crew are to set up base in a prefabricated, automated habitat on Mars named "HAB", with an artificial atmosphere and hydroponics for food. "HAB" awaits the first human arrivals and is hardened to withstand radiation and dust devils. The crew of Mars I consists of commander Kate Bowman (Carrie-Anne Moss) a former commander in the United States Navy; hot-headed lieutenant and pilot Ted Santen (Benjamin Bratt); systems engineer Robby Gallagher (Val Kilmer), whom the others call "The Janitor"; agnostic geneticist Quinn Burchenal (Tom Sizemore); an aging philosophical scientist and surgeon, Dr. Bud Chantillas (Terence Stamp); and terraforming scientist Chip Pettengill (Simon Baker), a last minute civilian replacement, often mocked by Santen for his unpreparedness for the mission. The crew's guide and navigator on the surface of Mars is to be "AMEE" (Autonomous Mapping Exploration and Evasion), a robot with contorting, canine-like movements, originally designed for military use, and comes with remote-controlled, propelled scouting and surveillance drones.

Mars Mission

The Mars mission faces disaster almost from the beginning. When Mars I arrives in the orbit of Mars around Phobos and Deimos, it is struck by gamma rays from an unexpected solar flare. The power is knocked off, a zero gravity fire starts, and depressurization all occur. Whilst most of the crew escape to the landing craft, Bowman remains aboard in a space suit in an attempt to repair Mars I, and orders the others to leave for the surface. The landing pod goes off-course, loses the package containing AMEE, and crashes down a canyon, barely protected by the airbags surrounding it. Gallagher is the first to alight, and the first human to set foot on another planet. In the buffeting of the landing, radio contact is lost, Chantillas has sustained fatal internal injuries, and orders the others to go on to HAB without him; he only asks of Gallagher to return a Martian rock to his granddaughter as a souvenir.

In orbit around Mars, Bowman manages to restore power and air to the Mars I with backup reserves. Unable to contact the ground crew, and seeing Chantillas' body through telescope, Bowman contacts Houston Mission Control back on Earth to tell them of the mission failure. Houston inform her that Mars-1 is in decaying orbit, but offers hope of restoring engine function in exiting Mars if she can leave orbit of the Red Planet within the window of 36 hours. On Mars, the landing party find their supply station HAB inexplicably and utterly destroyed. The accept the inevitable and await their own deaths by suffocation. Santen wanders off to look over a great Martian canyon, and is followed by Pettengill. Santen mocks Pettengill, telling him to "go away and die like a man, if you can." In anger, Pettengill pushes Santen off the cliffside, before returning to the others in shock. He tells the others that Santen jumped to commit suicide rather than suffocate, and the others warily view this with distrust.

Gallagher's air begins to run out first, and in a desperate last effort to survive, he pulls his helmet back and discovers that Mars' atmosphere is high altitude-like, thin but breathable. AMEE reunites with the crew, but with its artificial brain damaged from its long fall and crash to the surface. Gallagher goes to disassemble AMEE to use its radio, power source and remote drones, but AMEE sees this as a threat and flips from navigation mode to military mode. AMEE breaks a number of Burchenal's ribs to slow them down and flees, engaging in guerrilla warfare tactics against the men, stalking them and taking them out one at a time. Gallagher builds a makeshift radio from parts of the Mars Rover Pathfinder and uses it to contact Mars I. Bowman tells them their only chance to leave the surface is to use a old, Russian-made Kosmos probe's sample-return system to launch themselves into orbit. However, Bowman also tells them that the Kosmos is only big enough to fit two.

The trio take shelter from an ice storm in a cave, and Burchenal's condition worsens; it is clear he has internal bleeding. Paranoid that the other two will leave him behind, Pettengill flees with the radio as the other two sleep, but before he reaches the Kosmos he discovers a fresh green field of algae. Suddenly, Gallagher's remote cam to AMEE's vision turns on, waking up Gallagher and Burchenal, who watch through AMEE's eyes as AMEE savages Pettengill to death. They soon find Pettengill's corpse has become infested by small, swarming, previously-unknown creatures; they are bioluminescent, combustible, and beetle-like. Burchenal theorizes that the insects are native Martian life, dormant until the algal growth, which consume the algae and excrete oxygen, and identifies them as a means of better terraforming Mars. As blood drips from his open wounds, Burchenal is swarmed by the creatures, which start eating through his suit. He throws his samples to Gallagher, warns him to put on his helmet, and then Burchenal self-immolates himself with a flare, with also causes the creatures and the field of algae to burn up in a fire storm.

Gallagher reaches the Kosmos, finds sufficient fuel to power the rocket's engine, but not enough electrical power to kickstart it. Gallagher captures AMEE using an unspent parachute from the Kosmos, and lights AMEE on fire with a flare. Disabled, AMEE self-destructs by flying her own drones into her, but Gallagher manages to grab the power source from AMEE's chest in time. The extreme G-force of the Kosmos' blast gives Gallagher a heart attack, but the Kosmos is recovered by Bowman by space walk just in time to resuscitate Gallagher and leave orbit, also with Burchenal's samples and Chantillas' rock. Bowman ends the film by saying "With humanity at it's best and it's worst; we did it. We solved the riddle of Mars. And what now? Well, I have six months to get to know the janitor".

Music and soundtrack

The music for Red Planet was composed by New Zealand-based musician Graeme Revell, with performances from French singer Emma Shapplin. The soundtrack also included original music by artists DifferntGear, Sting, the Police, and Peter Gabriel.[14] In at least two scenes in the film, Gallagher (Val Kilmer) is heard singing the refrain of 19th Nervous Breakdown by The Rolling Stones.[15][16] Numerous versions of the soundtrack have been released and 19th Nervous Breakdown was included in some.[17]

Cast

Minor roles

Minor roles included models Jessica Morton and Caroline Bossi as Santen's website fans, Bob Neill as the voice of "Houston Mission Control", and an uncredited Neil Ross as "Space Suit (voice)".[20]

Lucille

Lucille is the name of the on-board computer vocal interface in the movie's Mars I spaceship. No voice actress portrayed the computer; Lucille speaks in a completely computer-generated voice, and is the first such instance of this in film. Lucille's voice was created by AT&T Labs and composed from a female speech database going back three decades.[21] This detail of the movie is known as one of the first "computer" characters to possess a realistic voice entirely computer generated. AT&T Bell Labs provide the film crew with the experimental voice synthesizer software that made this feat possible.[22] Todd R. Ramlow of PopMatters.com noted Lucille as "the most charismatic character in the film."[23]

Novelization

A novelization of Red Planet was written by Peter Telep and released a month before the film's premiere. It was published by Ace Books, Berkley Publishing Group, New York [24]

Reception

Box office

The US premiere of Red Planet was on 6th November 2000.[25] The film suffered competition from other recent releases such as Charlie's Angels, Little Nicky, Men of Honor, and Meet the Parents; and earlier summer releases which were still popular such as The Legend of Bagger Vance, Remember The Titans, Pay It Forward, and Billy Elliot.[26] Red Planet opened at #5 at the North American box office making $8.7 million USD in its opening weekend. In the UK, the film was released on 3rd December 2000 and made £330,39 in its opening weekend.[27] At the end of its ten weekend run, Red Planet was deemed a box office bomb, grossing $33 million worldwide against an estimated budget of $70 million.[28]

Rentals and home video

Red Planet fared much better on the small screen and recuperated its costs through home video; rentals of the film reached $22,700,000 in the US alone.[29] The extended and remastered VHS and DVD releases of Red Planet sold well, and were better critically received than the cinematic release.[30][31][32]

Critical response

The film polarized critics, with some slamming it and others praising it. On the movie review aggregate site Rotten Tomatoes, Red Planet has a critics rating of 14%, "rotten", based on 100 critic's reviews. The film does however have a slightly better rating on Rotten Tomatoes in the audience vote, standing at 33%.[33] On the Internet Movie Database, Red Planet has a weighted average of 5.5 out of 10 based 34,479 user reviews, and has a rating of 6.7 out of 10 as determined by the IMDB staff.[34] On BBCi the film has a critics rating of 1 out of 5, but a higher user rating of 3 out of 5.[35]

Some reviews were scathing. Stephen Holden's review in the New York Times was almost entirely negative, calling the film "a leaden, skimpily plotted space-age Outward Bound adventure with vague allegorical aspirations that remain entirely unrealized."[36] Paul Tatara of CNN said Red Planet is "a pretty film, but a stupid movie"[37] John J. Puccio of 'Movie Metropolis said: "Spectacular graphics and sound cannot save a bad film."[38]

Some reviews were positive, however. The Space Review gave a positive review of Red Planet, saying that, despite its inaccuracies, it was still better than the other films set on Mars which were released around the same time.[39] Mutant Reviewers from Hell gave the film a golden rating.[40] DustinPutman.com gave the film a praising review, saying Red Planet is "one of the most involving and well-made space-set thrillers since Ridley Scott's 1979 opus, Alien.[41]

Roger Ebert of the The Chicago Sun-Times praised Red Planet, giving it three out of four stars. Ebert said in his review:

"I've always been fascinated by zero-sum plots in which a task has to be finished within the available supplies of time, fuel and oxygen. The film has been sneered at in some quarters because it is not the kind of brainless high-tech computerized effects extravaganza now in favor. I like its emphasis on situation and character. The movie's ads seem to suggest Bug-Eyed Monsters of some sort, but the actual story developments are more ingenious and reasonable. There is a scene--call it the fireworks scene--that in its own way is one of the more memorable encounters I've seen with extraterrestrial life forms. Just like in 1950s sci-fi, the story's strong point isn't psychological depth or complex relationships, but brainy scientists trying to think their way out of a box that grows smaller every minute. To like that kind of story is to like this kind of movie."[42]

Scientific accuracy and inaccuracy

Accuracy

The film contain some deliberate errors explained in the context of their respective scenes, and have since been given viable explanations and corrections.[43] For example, during a conversation at the supper table, Burchenal (Tom Sizemore) mistakenly lists the 4 letters of genetic code as A, G, T, and P--the correct letters are A, G, T, and C. This can be explained, however, by the fact that Burchenal's character is intoxicated on moonshine he made in the ship's lab at the time. Later in the film, Burchenal labels the insect-like Martian creatures as "nematodes", which are in fact microscopic unsegmented worms rather than the beetle-like omnivorous insects of the film. This is likely a deliberate mistake by the fact Burchenal is being eaten alive at the time, and also in the latter stages of dying from severe internal injuries and internal bleeding given to him by AMEE.[44] Another example of something incorrectly regarded as an error in the film is that after the ground crew crashes on Mars, sunrise clearly shows the sun in a blue sky, despite the lack of water on Mars. The color of the sky is an atmospheric effect (blue light scatters more than red or green), and has nothing to do with nearby bodies of water.[45] Unlike many other science fiction films, the behavior of fire in zero gravity is depicted quite realistically.[46][47]

Phil Plait of Bad Astronomy, although noting the many inaccuracies, said that "some of the film is scientifically and technically accurate, sometimes cleverly so." In his positive review of the film, Plait lists dozens of parts which of the film which are incorrectly regarded as goofs and are actually factually correct.[48]

Error

The film contains dozens of instances of technical error, inaccuracy and pseudoscience. Some of the more obvious example of this include[49][50]:

  • Gravity is much weaker on Mars than what is depicted in the film. This fact is only referenced once in Red Planet, when the crew urinate at Martian sunrise and get some "high arc in the low gravity". Despite this one reference to Mars' weaker gravity, Mars' gravity is erroneously shown to be similar to that of the Earth throughout the rest of the film.
  • The terraform process depicted in the film is impossible. Although Mars has an atmosphere, it contains only trace oxygen, and is far too thin for humans to breathe. Simply producing more oxygen in the the atmosphere of Mars would be futile; unlike on Earth, there is no magnetosphere around the planet helping to keep the atmosphere in place - and so excess oxygen would simply "float off" into space. Also, because there is no magnetosphere and only a thin atmosphere around Mars, it is bombarded by micrometeorites, harmful solar rays and cosmic radiation which would be still be fatal to humans; these issues are not addressed in the film.

NASA withdrawl from project

Due to significant scientific inaccuracies, NASA refused to serve as a scientific adviser for the film. "The science was just so off the wall that eventually we felt, 'You guys go ahead and make your movie.' If there's something that's going to be so misleading to the public that we don't want to participate, then we'll say no," said Bert Ulrich, a NASA spokesperson, adding: "The big thing is, we want to make sure we're not misleading the public completely."[51]

References

  1. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/business
  2. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/trivia
  3. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/releaseinfo
  4. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/companycredits
  5. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/trivia
  6. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/business
  7. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/business
  8. ^ http://www.madmaxmovies.com/making/madmax3/Bartertown/Bartertown.html
  9. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/locations
  10. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/trivia
  11. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/trivia
  12. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/trivia?tab=mc
  13. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/taglines
  14. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/soundtrack
  15. ^ http://www.thespacereview.com/article/1473/2
  16. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/trivia
  17. ^ http://www.soundtrackcollector.com/catalog/soundtrackdetail.php?movieid=10481
  18. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/trivia
  19. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/trivia
  20. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/fullcredits
  21. ^ http://www2.research.att.com/~ttsweb/tts/redplanet.html
  22. ^ http://www.unexplainable.net/info-theories/space_movie_trivia_and_facts_red_planet_2000.php
  23. ^ http://www.popmatters.com/pm/review/red-planet/
  24. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/literature
  25. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/releaseinfo
  26. ^ http://www.boxofficemojo.com/weekend/chart/?yr=2000&wknd=45&p=.htm
  27. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/business
  28. ^ Red Planet (2000)
  29. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/business
  30. ^ http://www.currentfilm.com/dvdreviews2/redplanetdvd.html
  31. ^ http://www.tower.com/red-planet-val-kilmer-dvd/wapi/107033734
  32. ^ http://www.amazon.com/Red-Planet-Simon-Baker/dp/B0045HCJ0S
  33. ^ Rotten Tomatoes.com page for Red Planet
  34. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/ratings?ref_=tt_ov_rt
  35. ^ http://www.bbc.co.uk/films/2000/11/27/red_planet_2000_review.shtml?ref_=ttexrv_exrv_3
  36. ^ "Red Planet: Finding the Terra Not So Firma on Mars," Stephen Holden, New York Times, 10 November 2000
  37. ^ http://edition.cnn.com/2000/SHOWBIZ/Movies/11/10/review.red.planet/index.html
  38. ^ http://moviemet.com/review/red-planet-blu-ray-review#.UXbfZ0rMDtk
  39. ^ http://www.thespacereview.com/article/1473/1
  40. ^ http://www.mutantreviewers.com/rredplanet.html?ref_=ttexrv_exrv_87
  41. ^ http://www.themovieboy.com/reviews/r/00_redplanet.htm
  42. ^ http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/red-planet-2000
  43. ^ http://www.moviemistakes.com/film1056/corrections
  44. ^ http://www.dailyscript.com/scripts/red_planet.pdf | pg. 56
  45. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/trivia?tab=gf
  46. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/trivia
  47. ^ http://www.unexplainable.net/info-theories/space_movie_trivia_and_facts_red_planet_2000.php
  48. ^ http://www.badastronomy.com/bad/movies/redplanet2.html
  49. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0199753/trivia?tab=gf
  50. ^ http://www.moviemistakes.com/film1056
  51. ^ Rebecca Keegan (1 September 2011). "NASA reaches its outer limit". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 1 September 2011.
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