Stargate

Plot synopsis:
Egyptologist and linguist Daniel Jackson, Ph.D. is invited by Catherine Langford to translate Egyptian hieroglyphs on cover stones that her father had unearthed in Giza, Egypt in 1928. Jackson is taken to a U.S. Air Force installation, and told the project is classified information by its commander Special Operations Colonel Jack O'Neil. Jackson determines that the hieroglyphs refer to a "stargate" which uses constellations as spatial coordinates. On this revelation, Jackson is shown that the base has this Stargate, also discovered by Langford's father. They use Jackson's coordinates to align the Stargate's metal ring with markings along its outside, and once all seven are locked in, a wormhole opens, connecting the Stargate with a distant planet. Jackson joins O'Neil and other soldiers as they pass through the wormhole, though expresses concern at a nuclear bomb they brought as a last resort.
On the arid desert planet, they find themselves in a pyramid-like structure. Jackson locates the Stargate and its controls, but lacks the coordinates to return home. O'Neil orders some men to stay behind to guard the Stargate. Nearby, they discover a tribe of humans working to mine a strange mineral from the planet. Jackson is able to communicate with them as they speak a variation of Ancient Egyptian, and finds the tribe sees them as emissaries of their god Ra (Jaye Davidson). The tribe's chieftain Kasuf presents Jackson with his daughter Sha'uri as a gift, and though Jackson initially refuses her, he becomes romantically attached to her. O'Neil befriends the teenaged boy Skaara and his friends, in part because Skaara reminds him of his long-deceased son. Through hidden markings and discussions with the tribe, Jackson learns that Ra is an alien being who had come to Earth during the Ancient Egyptian period, looking to possess human bodies to extend his own life. Ra enslaved these humans and brought some to this planet through the Stargate to mine the mineral that is used in the alien technology. The humans on Earth revolted, overthrew Ra's overseers, and buried the Stargate to prevent its use. Ra forbade the humans in the tribe from becoming literate, fearing another revolt. During this investigation, Jackson comes across a cartouche containing six of the seven symbols for the Stargate, but the seventh has been broken off.
That night, Ra's ship lands atop the pyramid structure, and O'Neil's men there are captured or killed by Ra's soldiers. When Jackson, O'Neil, and the other men return, they end up in a firefight against Ra's soldiers. Jackson is killed and the others captured. Ra places Jackson's body in a sarcophagus-like device that regenerates him. Ra then explains to Jackson that he has found the nuclear bomb the humans brought and has used his alien technology to increase its explosive power a hundred-fold, and threatens to send it back through the Stargate. Ra orders the human tribe to watch as he prepares to execute Jackson and the others to demonstrate his power, but Skaara and his friends create a diversion that allows Jackson, O'Neil, and the others to escape. They flee to nearby caves to hide from Ra. Skaara and his friends celebrate, and Skaara draws out a sign of victory in a wall, which Jackson recognizes as the final symbol.
O'Neil and his men aid Skaara in overthrowing the remaining overseers, and then launch an attack on Ra. Ra sends out fighter ships against the humans while he orders his ship to take off. The humans outside are forced to surrender to the fighter ships' pilots when they run out of ammo, but the rest of the tribe, having finally learned of their false gods, rebel against the pilots and overthrow them. Sha'uri is killed, but Jackson takes her body and sneaks aboard Ra's ship, using a teleportation system, leaving O'Neil to fight Ra's lead soldier. After Jackson places Sha'uri in the regeneration device. Ra discovers them, but O'Neil activates the teleportation system, killing Ra's lead soldier, and allowing Jackson and Sha'uri to escape. O'Neil realizes that Ra had rigged the bomb to prevent him from disarming it. O'Neil and Jackson decide to use the teleportation system to transport the bomb to Ra's ship. The ensuing blast destroys the ship in space. With the humans freed, the remaining team prepares to return to Earth, but Jackson tells O'Neil he plans to stay behind with Sha'uri and the others. O'Neil acknowledges Jackson's request and, with the others, enters the Stargate to return home.
=== Director's cut ===
The director's cut had several scenes which were cut from the theatrical release. The first such scene took place immediately after the excavation of the Stargate in 1928 and showed petrified Horus guards near the cover stones; the producers had tried to introduce the idea that beings had attempted to come through the Stargate after its burial, but they cut the scene for time concerns.

Tags: violence, cult, suspenseful, action, atmospheric

Review:
With a capable cast, solid script and excellent set design, this is a big-budget adventure for viewers looking for pure escapist fun.The ever reliable Kurt Russell plays the square-jawed, world weary Jack O'Neil, who is responsible for leading the military mission to another world.
At the time, this was a different type of role for Spader and he handles the humorous content of his scenes with great success.There's also an appearance by "The Crying Game"'s Jaye Davidson as the evil baddie, Ra. Although Davidson's role is quite small, he brings an other-worldly presence to his part.The score by David Arnold is excellent.A great idea for a movie, I can't help but think the concept would have made a successful television series....
The somebody they sent for is archaeologist/linguist James Spader who deciphers some ancient Egyptian writing and poof, the gate is upright and operational.At that point the military takes over led by a hardnosed professional played by Kurt Russell.
He's going through that gate with a team of special forces and with James Spader presumably so they can communicate with whatever life is out there.Stargate is a teleportation device and the team travels through time and space and ends up across the galaxy on a primitive planet where the people worship a being called Ra played by Jaye Davidson.
Stargate the movie :- superb atmosphreric music, great special effects, excellent cast, intriguing story but - not surprised it launched a successful TV series which has run and run.
Some people wouldn't had minded that by the way.Even though the story itself is not that much special, it still has a great and original as well as an intriguing concept, that somehow knows to connect an alien world to ancient Egypt and their Gods.
Also greatly cast was Jaye Davidson as Ra. He's a true memorable villain and it makes you realize what a great shame it is that Jaye Davidson has never acted in many movies, simply just because he never really enjoyed acting much, despite having also received an Oscar nomination for his debut role in "The Crying Game".Truly a recommendable science-fiction classic from the '90's.8/10http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/.
If that's what you think STARGATE is going to be about you'll be as disappointed as I was first time I saw itOf the cast Kurt Russell and his special forces group are slightly wooden but I won't criticise the cast since these type of characters always lack flair in these genre movies .
Thankfully Emmerich doesn't go overboard on the CGI while he also had the good sense ( Say it again ) to cast Jaye Davidson as RaBy no means a classic SF movie STARGATE is solid entertainment and is rather more enjoyable on second viewing.
Joining the group going through the portal, Daniel finds a world like Egypt, full of peaceful people worshiping the sungod Ra. Things go great for a while until, that is, Ra shows up.Having now spawned two TV spin off series (neither of which I have ever bothered with) I suppose this film might have gained a bit of respect looking back on it as the starting point for a relatively successful franchise, but this does not mean that the film has suddenly become a wonderful piece of action sci-fi  cause it ain't!
The action is OK but without a decent plot to engage the audience it is really nothing but noisy special effects  effects that, may I say, have not dated well at all in the past decade.The cast try hard but even James Spader struggles to buy into the idea of him as an action star; he appears to be laughing at the script at times in the early scenes!
STARGATE should be the perfect movie for me: an interesting premise, grounded in real-life theory (I've been reading Graham Hancock's FINGERPRINTS OF THE GODS recently, and am familiar with Von Daniken's writings) and made with a high enough budget to do the special effects justice.And watching it, it's hard to fault the production.
Stargate is, as far as I'm concerned, better than the original TV series, which I've watched a couple of time without really getting interested, but then I'm not a fan.The good.
If you are going down to the video store, consider reaching for something else like Independence Day (made by the same people, full of flaws, but a roller coaster ride and lots of fun), Contact (similar space travel scenes to Stargate, but much more intelligently carried out) or even The Mummy, which is about as inaccurate on Ancient Egypt (why do they have pyramids in Thebes...???) but it has more laughs and action on the way..
Th effects might not live up to today's standard but much better than other 90s movie and the concept and this whole idea behind the Stargate is interested and explored more deeply in the shows.The villain Ra (Jaye Davidson) also show a lot of promise early in the movie but unfortunately he can't live up to promise and was kind of an lackluster villain in the end.
On Abydos they meet Skaara, Sha'uri and Kasuf, these character has to band together and fight against both time and Ra. The movie isn't fantastic by no means but it's a great starting point for the three series that continue after the movie.Roland Emmerich is not a great director but somehow he didn't screw this one up, sure the first Independence Day is also fine but his other movies have been mediocre at best.
The reason I had not watched it earlier were my doubts - I'm not a fan of sci-fi movies and aliens and least but not last of Roland Emmerich (since watching The Day After Tomorrow, which I didn't like at all) so I was quite certain I would be disappointed...THOUGH, this disappointment never came.
Not to mention the acting qualities of both the actors.The ambient: Ancient Egypt, Anubis soldiers, sand and pyramids, aliens, the people in the village, strange animals, all mixed with modern- day soldiers who are entering in this ancient and fascinating world with doubts and in disbelief unawares and wary of what might be expecting them.The story: There are no plot holes, everything is explained to an observing viewer.
A pity Jaye had chosen to leave his acting career, because as many already have said, he could have made a great deal of another great movies with his talent.The costumes: exquisite ones, especially those of the ancient Egypt gods as Anubis and Horus and the main villain.To conclude, it's a movie definitely worth watching, with character development,intriguing plot, lovable characters and great ambient to put the story/theory in.
The FX is awful, that acting even worse--Kurt Russell gives the most dominant, WOODEN performance of his career and James Spader makes me want to get an insulin injection--He's so sugary little boy cute when I wanted a solid plot, or one plot twist and---Oh I forgot what I else wanted other than I wanted the film to end and I had such high hopes walking in!
and it focus on ancient religion and believes of help from other beings.The story of the rings being used as gate way travel to distant worlds is pretty Awesome, and the film is also very smart on how they achieve communication between all the different species by having them all have some ancient language in common as they all have ancient gods who they fear or believe in.This is an incredibly awesome film, with some really cool action scenes, very well written dialogue and really great acting from Kurt Russell and James Spader.
Any book showing sci-fi history talks about Independence Day or Armageddon or even Attack of the Killing Tomatoes, but they don't even leave a line for this picture.I think Stargate is the best sci-fi adventure or space opera since Star Wars, because it's overwhelming, all it's elements are extremely creative, each new discovery of the characters in the world they find is astonishing, the characters have personal dramas to overcome.
It's an epic where my favorite items, ancient history, particularly from ancient Egypt, and science, particularly space science, are combined with a major story of emancipation by the people against dictatorship and God, where the people question the existence of God and decide to make a revolution.Despite all the horrors Roland Emmerich has done like ID4, Godzilla or The Patriot, Stargate remains an amazing picture, with a classical direction, all the elements well accomplished, extremely serious developments and without stupid jokes or comedy.
Often taken as pure entertainment and not to be seen again, for me, Stargate, which I've seen more than three dozen times, has become a cult movie, but unlike other cult movies I love, such as Blade Runner, 12 Monkeys, Brazil or Gattaca, this film produced by Mario Kassar and created by the minds of Roland Emmerich and Dean Devlin is different because almost no one likes it and no one talks about it.
Ra, when we finally meet him, is a sight to behold; never has such a feminine young man been so imposing.The sets, costumes and effects perfectly capture the feel of the film; Abydos (the planet at the other end of the Stargate) might look like Egypt, but there's something about it that makes it much more distant than another continent.The only thing which really mars the film are its occasional descents into kitsch, including one of the death scenes later in the film, reduced to silliness by careless use of extreme cliche.
While these moments are, thankfully, fairly well spaced, some of the dialogue also contributes, as do a couple of plot holes.But still, Stargate is good solid fun with a bit more thought behind it than usual, and it's a great foundation for the television series that followed - and improved - on the film..
Then the t.v. series came along,which without even seeing an episode,i hated.However,after seeing some of the first and second seasons,it eventually grew on me and now i never miss an episode.BUT,i still think a sequel could be made with the original cast members and director Roland Emmerich at the helm.It may seem pointless since the t.v. series has covered many stories that could have been the basis for a sequel,but i think it would be interesting to have a new movie pick up where the original left off and start again as if there were no t.v. series,almost like an alternate reality from one of the later first season episodes.Does anyone else out there want a sequel or is it just wishful thinking on my part?.
Stargate was a new idea with a fabulous new way to travel between worlds or maybe even time, it is not clear until the end of the story exactly what was happening and that is a great thing about it, it is not predictable at all.
Those flaws didn't really bother me at all and I think that this is Roland Emmerich's best film next to Independence Day and The Patriot.The acting on the whole is pretty good especially Kurt Russell and James Spader who had great chemistry together throughout the film.
It also has some good dialog especially it's nice moments with the main character and the villain who is quite menacing.Stargate does have a hokey concept, but I don't understand why some people hated it because I think that this is an interesting film and I simply understood that it got a cult following over the years.
Sure, Spader played a great nerd and Russell was good as depressed individual (at first), but having a boatload of characters with different accents is much more fun to listen and watch on screen.
But this is never explained.In the final analysis, Stargate is a simple "humans beat up on aliens" movie, no different from the director's later film, Indepdendence Day. Ironic that it should spawn a thoughtful series which has surpassed the original.
It's interesting to come to Stargate about 22 years after it first came out without having seen it before; I didn't have the nostalgia for it that people I know have or had (my wife at one point in her very young life called it her favorite film), and it also comes after seeing everything else that Roland Emmerich (with occasional collaborator Dean Devlin) put out since.
But the story moves at a great pace, despite its wacked and dopey moving parts, and Spader and Russell ground it as two characters you can care about in a sea of people who are walking-talking tropes and types (oh, there's also the element of Aliens with it being a military group dispatched to check out this alien land and the violence they come up against), and things like culture-clash and language/communication barriers and villains with amazing Egyptian masks and sets and all sorts of things.Stargate has parts that work really well in a sea of things that flat-out don't.
I have always had a sneaking liking for ancient Egypt, how the managed to build the pyramids without modern day technology is astounding, add this to my love for Science Fiction putting to two together is bound to intrigue me.IMO The characters in the TV Show SG1, were portrayed better than in the film, which lets it down.
It was a movie panned by critics; it was the first movie to launch an official website and one of the many films featuring the bad-ass Kurt Russell playing a character that would later be a cult character in both movie and TV history (a show was made in 1997).Stargate is a time travel movie about a doomed archaeologist (James Spader) who gets a call from an old lady that tells him about this discovery where a portal can take communicate with other dimensions.
O'Neill and Jackson go in with a group of marines and discover that they're part of the other dimension where it resembles Egypt with a god by the name of Ra who comes to hurt the civilians where it's just a matter of time before the expedition team becomes extinct if not finding their way home.The film itself is a bad-ass movie where science fiction fans and those who follow Egyptian history will be surprise that mixing certain elements can make people watch a flick without being disappointed..
Does the military really send suicidal people on secret missions, even for the purpose of killing themselves along with destroying a prized possession?Let's go down the list of a few cliches in this movie: (1) the "loser" scientist who's hired for a special mission (Notice how when everyone walks out of his lecture, the one person who is interested hides and waits in the car outside, mysteriously, instead of just walking right up to him?), (2) a suicidal soldier in need of redemption, (3) a group of scientists talking a bunch of mumbo-jumbo about writings that they obviously know nothing about, (4) the love story between two unlikely people, who can barely communicate with each other, (5) a piece of jewelry with sentimental value, (6) a bomb with a read digital readout, (7) the action climax where all the good guys beat up the bad guys,  and (8) the old line "Tastes like chicken".The filmmakers obviously wanted (and have pretty much stated so) this film to be confused with great classics like "Lawrence of Arabia", simply because of the desert setting, I guess.
It was made to be a hit, in fact, it should have been a far bigger hit than it turned out to be.I mean, just the concept makes me want to watch it all over again...It's the same concept as "Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" except they remembered that Indiana Jones has no place in the world of Aliens.In fact I would have even loved the TV show if, you know, all the Alien worlds they visited didn't look a lot like Canada.All you have here is a really fun action adventure sci-fi movie that doesn't try to make any statements.
Thus speaks Stargate.The movie starts off great with the whole thing collapsing under its own weight of misunderstanding the concept and turning it into a good looking but incredibly inept military exercise with dull action scenes and unbelievably uninteresting cultural exchanges.The Alien look is outstanding as are the sets, but it shamelessly uses a deep concept and ridicules its insights.
I'd like to see James Spader in the series Stargate SG-1, or any other type science fiction programs, and or movies coming up.I think he is a convincing actor, and very entertaining!
Or maybe you will just have an enjoyable time watching this amazing Sci Fi fantasy action film of amazing Egyptian costumes and characters and sets which bring this fantastic story to life..
From the spaceship to the gliders, everything has a touch of old Egyptian myth mixed with advanced alien know-how.With a combination of good dialog, an interesting plot, a creative way to expound upon ancient mythologies, mostly engaging characters and good special effects, "Stargate" is a very entertaining film.
Stargate is nothing but a good, old-fashioned action film that offers a fun time.
Stargate is a great movie!Although not Kurt Russell`s best but he performs good enough.James Spader was good and Viveca Lindfors was very good.Jaye Davidson was very surprising with the role!The film has a great score by David Arnold.The story about Ra and what he really is,is a scary one and what he arrived in is so neat.The film is very good and is action packed and is a must see!.
Oh my God, does good triumph over evil, you will have to watch this movie to find out.While there is some action, it is really the Science Fiction idea that makes this story work.
I've been watching Stargate-SG1 for about a year now, and It is above excellent, the best sci-fi out there, but it and the movie have major, MAJOR differences.