Watch Space Cowboys instead!

Rating: 1/10 (31 March 2002)

A lot of people on this site have said it before: this is a bad movie.
Not just a bad _film_ - I wasn't expecting "Wild Strawberries" - but a bad _flick_, in that it's tedious and yawn-inducing when not nerve-grating.
There is a bunch of characters with a comical potential, whose development gets tossed on the dung heap in favor of shrieking hysteria. The so-called suspense boils down to a couple of "dramatic" countdowns and last-minute saves that might have been picked up from any action cutting-room floor. And romance??? Gimme a break! When all the women in evidence are either twerps or bitches? Surprise, we aren't in 1940 anymore. And, incidentally, we aren't in 1960 either. Round about then I was a kid somewhere in East Europe, and the flag-waving in Armageddon brings back all sorts of creepy memories. So it's the Stars and Stripes instead of hammer and sickle - same difference when you get it jammed down your throat.
Interestingly, I happened to watch Armageddon within two days of Space Cowboys. The similarities are striking, and Space Cowboys actually achieve a lot of what Armageddon attempts and flops at. Space Cowboys genuinely integrate comedy, drama and romance throughout the entire film in a way that Armageddon achieves only in the sales pitch. Yes, it's another entertaining Hollywood movie and as such basically predictable, but it does keep one's interest up as to _how_ the unlikely crew will manage to save the world. The characters - men and women - do rise off the cardboard and inspire genuine feelings of sympathy, identification, suspicion, or hate, as the case may be. And, just as a sample, contrast Space Cowboys' truly touching final trip to the Moon with the tacky, soppy, unintentionally comical finale of Armageddon!
So, for a bit of honest space action entertainment, skip Armageddon and put your video rental money on Space Cowboys.