From: psperson@old.netcom.invalid   
      
   Some ruminations on two films I saw recently but have no intention of   
   buying on disc.   
      
   /Moonfall/   
   This is not a bad Emmerich film. /10,000 BC/ and /Anonymous/ were bad   
   Emmerich films. But it isn't a really good one either.   
      
   If you are hoping for something like, say, /The Day After Tomorrow/ or   
   /2012/, you may be disappointed. You will see characters and events   
   that, in many cases, appear to be based on other films. In fact, there   
   isn't much left over.   
      
   Except for the Moon itself. It is a "construct", that is, it is   
   artificial with an outer disguise. IOW, if you have ever wondered what   
   the Moon in Weber's /Mutineers Moon/ might look like on the Silver   
   Screen, this will give you some idea. Not as Weber imagined it, to be   
   sure, and the plot is completely different, with the Machines   
   operating on a Universal scale and looking like the nanobots in the   
   remake of /The Day the Earth Stood Still/.   
      
   As I said, "other films". No real coherence or particularly memorable   
   characters here.    
      
   /The Wandering Earth II/   
   When I saw this, I was surprised to see that it was a prequel and not   
   a sequel. I was also disappointed at it.    
      
   This basically documents how the Wandering Earth Project (and MOSS)   
   came to be and traces it through several crises. Including some very   
   well organized physical attacks. But it simply doesn't match the level   
   of energy I remember from the first film, although reviewing the   
   Wikipedia plot summary of the original suggests that seeing this first   
   make make it more understandable.   
      
   Part of the problem -- for me -- was that each crisis is not only   
   foretold, but an actual on-screen /countdown/ appears. This greatly   
   reduces the level of tension especially since, having seen the first   
   film, we know each crisis must be resolved in a satisfactory manner.   
      
   OTOH, if you are wondering about the science behind this endeavor, the   
   film does go into more detail of how they planned to do it. I'm not   
   sure how well it would actually work, but it isn't as simple as   
   stopping the Earth and heading off directly away from the Sun. It's   
   more like expanding the orbit, getting velocity boosts from gravity,   
   and accelerating/coasting/decelerating to reach their destination.   
   Whether the time said to be needed is realistic I have no idea.   
      
   It is, IOW, about the launch of a really big Generation Ship. And the   
   first film showed that Generation Ship encountering Jupiter, with   
   members of the first generation playing an unexpected part.   
   --    
   "In this connexion, unquestionably the most significant    
   development was the disintegration, under Christian   
   influence, of classical conceptions of the family and   
   of family right."   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)