Well Crafted, but Really Hard to Believe

Rating: 7/10 (3 January 2014)

First of all, special effects are first rate, acting pretty good, and decent suspense. It's a likable movie that deals in scientific realities and events that "could" happen. Like so many films that are of this genre, we have to look at the likelihood of a single person being able to accomplish what she does. Just the punishment she takes would be enough to squash most mortals. She is smashed against bulkheads, caught in webs of detritus, oxygen starved, burned and frozen, but never into submission. I guess I can't criticize her surviving since in the story she does. There is also her ability to adapt to a setting (a Russian space ship) where she seems to know an awful lot. Granted, she is an astronaut, but her ability to adapt is beyond the pale. All that said, it's a thrill-a-minute science fiction thriller with two charismatic actors (a bit of the supernatural as well). I left exhausted and somewhat satisfied, but when I thought about the whole of it, I realized it wasn't a great movie.