“I can’t remember any of my life before this flight began.”
A movie as seminal as Alien is bound to produce knockoffs. Predator is one of the more successful ones, because it flipped the script and took place on Earth. The vastness of space produces existential dread that is catnip to filmmakers and filmgoers. Not only are you trapped in a huge ship with a monster, there’s no way out. In space, the tagline goes, no one can hear you scream. It induces a sense of helplessness that you feel down to your marrow. As far as Alien knockoffs go, Pandorum, while certainly uneven in places, is one of the better ones (its terrific leading actors certainly don’t hurt). This movie has as much of The Descent in its DNA as it does Alien, and does a solid job of mixing science fiction with horror, while not leaning too heavily on either genre.
The film establishes tension early and effectively. Corporal Bower (Ben Foster) wakes up aboard the ship Elysium, which is an opening we’ve seen a lot in sci-fi (does anyone ever wake up when they’re supposed to?), but Pandorum differentiates itself by not glossing over the effects of hypersleep. Bower’s legs are atrophied and he can hardly stand, and he has some memory loss., which makes for some fun horror as Foster is forced to discover the ship anew. Foster does a capable job anchoring these opening scenes, when it’s just him in a ship, because Foster is a uniquely watchable actor who brings his own compelling intensity to any role he takes. Look at him in Hostage, Hell or High Water, 3:10 to Yuma, 30 Days of Night, The Mechanic…the list goes on. He is one of our finest journeyman actors, and while he might never be a lead in a film (making Pandorum a rarity), his is always a welcome presence.
Bower is soon joined by Lieutenant Payton (Dennis Quaid, bringing his usual gruffness to the role). Neither of them know what’s going on, and they only have a tenuous grasp on their own identities. Director Christian Alvart (Case 39) does an admirable job in the first twenty minutes or so of this film; the experience is as disorienting for us as it is for Bower and Payton. We don’t know what’s going on, but we’re not supposed to.
Alvart plays with the standard sci-fi-horror scenes, such as Bower navigating a claustrophobic ventilation shaft, but he really just wants to get to the meat of the story, which he introduces, against all odds, at the half-hour mark. Bower and Payton see signs of another presence on the ship, but it’s only after Bower meets Shepard (Norman Reedus) that it’s confirmed. Shepard slathers himself in grease to mask his scent, and disobeys orders, insisting that the chain of command is an outdated notion.
There are monsters on board the Elysium, which is just one of the film’s twists (of which it might have one too many). It’s a bold gambit, and it’s more or less successful. It makes for a fun juxtaposition of horror imagery mixed with science fiction trappings. When I say “horror,” I don’t mean the functional, brutal monsters out of Alien or Predator, I mean the simple but horrific design of the crawlers from The Descent. Pandorum is as much a monster movie as it is a sci-fi movie.
A less successful twist is the introduction of other crew members, some of whom have been awake for several months (which, honestly, works well to further disorient Bower). None of these new crew members make for particularly interesting additions (Reedus disappears pretty early on), and one is incredibly annoying. There’s Manh (Cung Le), a Vietnamese member of the agriculture team; his inclusion, and the fact that he doesn’t speak English, is actually a cool way to show how expansive the crew is. Less interesting is Nadia (Antje Traue), who looks like Milla Jovovich and seems to have received only one direction from Alvart: “Act like Milla Jovovich.” But Traue is Meryl goddamn Streep compared to Erick Rouse, who plays the demented Leland, a former cook on the ship who has turned into a cannibal. Rouse cranks everything up to 11 and overacts nearly as much as does Cam Gigandet, who plays his Lt. Gallo as a smirking high school bully.
Pandorum is one of those films that just throws twists at the wall to see what sticks. When they do, it’s a delight. As Gallo taunts and cajoles Payton, the film gradually shows you that they’re the same person: Gallo’s nametag changes to say Payton, and when he tries to escape, he does so in an escape pod with Payton’s name on it. Quaid is leagues better than Gigandet, but these scenes work, for the most part, because they give Quaid something to do beyond talking to Foster on a comm.
But it’s with its last twist that Pandorum goes truly big. Not only are Payton and Gallo the same person, but it’s revealed that he was responsible for the deaths of the original crew, thanks to the titular malady, which is something like space madness. More than that, the Elysium‘s voyage has gone much longer than it was supposed to: they’ve been on the ship for almost a thousand years. Oh, and they’re not in space at all, they’re actually at the bottom of the sea (Pandorum reveals this with a great shot of bioluminescent jellyfish and stingrays).
Pandorum is kind of a mess, but in the best way. It has a ton of ideas that it’s playing with, and any film like that won’t be completely successful. However, the level of ambition on display, coupled with fine performances from Foster and Quaid, make it a solid genre film that is easy to get wrapped up in. Is it the best sci-fi horror move ever made? No, but it’s not trying to be. It wears its influences on its sleeve, and does right by them. This is no masterpiece, but at times it’s a lot of fun.
10/1: Dawn of the Dead
10/2: Drag Me to Hell
10/3: Pet Sematary
10/4: The Descent
10/5: Repo! The Genetic Opera
10/6: Desierto
10/7: The Blair Witch Project
10/8: Blair Witch
10/9: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
10/10: A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010)
10/11: Prince of Darkness
10/12: 30 Days of Night
10/13: Friday the 13th (2009)
10/14: Slither
10/15: Tremors
10/16: Pandorum
10/17: It Follows
10/18: A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night
10/19: Poltergeist
10/20: Paranormal Activity
10/21: Creepshow
10/22: VHS
10/23: Nosferatu the Vampyre
10/24: An American Werewolf in London
10/25: The Witch
10/26: The Rocky Horror Picture Show
10/27: Cronos
10/28: The Hills Have Eyes
10/29: The Hills Have Eyes (2006)
10/30: Tucker and Dale vs. Evil
10/31: Halloween (2007)
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