a multimillion dollar blah movie

Rating: 3/10 (18 March 2002)

spoilers
This movie is not action packed; it's slow and boring. It's not funny or exciting, it's predictable and plays on cheap sentimentality and vague patriotism. The special effects are not imaginative or impressive. They are noisy and uninspired.
The acting talent is wasted on hopelessly stupid one-liners and clichés. These are spouted by characters they ought to just be called `gentle giant black man,' `eccentric genius who is about to crack,' `square jawed hero coming of age,' `by-the-book coward,' `luckless gambler who lives by a code of honor,' `impulsive princess' and so on.
And the writing! How many undramatic countdowns did they think they could fit in this thing? Does a scene where people have to defuse a bomb by cutting one or another wire even count as fiction anymore? The drama of the last 15 minutes of the movie depends on the audience caring if some jerk can put aside his personal differences with Ben Affleck and say bye bye to Liv Tyler in time TO SAVE THE EARTH. All the work is done; we just have to wait a couple more seconds for Harry Stamper, the jerk, to toss off a few cotton candy lines. I know Bruce Willis is a generally charismatic guy, but his Harry Stamper character is an obnoxious bore. I thought he earned the Golden Razzy he was awarded for this role.
Since the movie is so long, the plot so obvious, and the dialogue so disposable, one can't help but notice the lame inaccuracies, inconsistencies and plot holes. 800 feet into something the size of TX is less than a pinprick. Try walking 800 feet into TX and see how close to the center you are. After all the discussion about the artificial gravity on the Russian station, it appears to be arbitrary once inside. Actually, gravity comes and goes throughout the movie. Does it make any sense that anyone besides Michael Bay would give these morons a couple shuttles and send them to blow up an asteroid threatening the earth?
The sentimental phone/insurance/cola commercial style montages were revolting.
I do like action movies. Really. This one is boring, stupid and really stuck on itself. It deserves hatred and scorn because it's everything Hollywood's most expensive efforts have become - a bunch of cheap cliches running from one expensive explosion to another. Oh yes, the whole thing is permeated by a Neanderthal conservative outlook on sex, politics and so on.