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The Core
(Reviewed February 28, 2003)
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Regular Back Row readers (it is to laugh) will wonder if I suffered a botched lobotomy before writing this review, but "The Core" is really a quite decent thrill-ride popcorn movie--DEFINITELY much better than anyone will
be expecting.
Sure, the plot is flat-out preposterous (good guys on a laser-shooting "shuttle" that literally journeys to the center of the earth). But this movie wastes almost no time on anything that requires engaging one's brain as it flies right along. Also, the special effects--especially the visuals of the Earth's interior--are generally excellent. (What's too bad is that the trailer and TV ad for "The Core" completely give away a MAJOR plot point that is supposed to come as a surprise in the film. Bastards!)
Speaking of the TV ad: One odd difference between a short clip shown within the ad and the actual scene in the movie occurs when the requisite Computer Nerd character asks for "Hot Pockets and Star Trek tapes." In the movie--at least at the screening I attended--he asks for "Hot Pockets and Xena tapes." I get the feeling the TV ad was altered because "The Core" has been finished and waiting for a release date so long that the canceled "Xena" series has vanished from the mists of most people's memories. (Considering how badly the latest "Star Trek" movie fared at the box office, maybe even that cultural touchstone was a bad choice...)
The studio has had a hard time finding a release date for the "The Core," first because its scenes of global destruction might have spooked a terrorism-skittish world, and later when the Space Shuttle blew up. ("The Core" includes a Shuttle scene that is just plain eerie to watch in light of that disaster; the whole audience sort of tenses up.) Also, I'll bet the movie's producers are wishing they had not included a heavily-accented Frenchman among the cast, now that the slack-jawed yahoo-warmonger faction in this country is so anti all things francais. Well, except for Frenchie from "American Idol," that is. C'est la vie!
Back Row Grade: B
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