Armageddon

Rating:
Summary: Worst Movie of 1998 - Bar None
Review: Cheesy, uninspired disaster flick starring actors who, frankly, should know better: Bruce Willis, Ben Affleck, and Billy Bob Thornton. It should come as no shock that this film is a bust; it's brought to us by Michael Bay and Jerry Bruckheimer, the boys who gave us "Pearl Harbor," which may be the worst movie of 2001. I mean, it makes "Independence Day" look like "Saving Private Ryan." Should you feel the need to watch a disater flick, please by all means avoid "Armageddon."

Rating:
Summary: Disaster MissFired
Review: This is one of those movies that works much better on the small screen.

It has a great cast, some memorable performances and some state-of-the-art Special Effects, however, the story is a little week and even sappy in some points.

In the theatre it kind of bored me, but the DVD is much better. Not many extras but it does have the Aerosmith music video for the film on it.

This is a better film to watch in the living room with your family and should have passed the big screen. Disaster missed this mark!

Rating:
Summary: michael Bay's work = cheese
Review: When I think of Michael Bay's work I think cheesyness, same content, and his postcard scene looks. The action is really boring, and u already know whats gonna happen. I can go on and on but the one star says it all. Peace

Rating:
Summary: Michael Bay and Jerry Bruckheimer
Review: those two guys know how to tap into our emotions. i keep feeling like i want to enjoy this movie, like i have to enjoy it. if i dont enjoy it, i'm a fool. but the story isnt all that good. and scientifically incorrect. that's why i give it three stars instead of what i'm "supposed" to give it, five.

Rating:
Summary: It hurt to watch this.
Review: This is a great film for those with the attention span of about 15 seconds. I had high hopes for this film. Alas I couldn't stop myself from making fun of it. Aside from the performances of Steve Buscemi and Bruce Willis, this film was ridiculously bad. Shooting a rifle on an oil rig? Flames on an asteroid (no oxygen for those who don't understand), and machine guns on a moon buggy!? I said machine guns on a moon-buggy!?

Once again I sat through a worthless piece of garbage. At one point I hoped Buscemi would lose it and kill them so the film would end. But he didn't, and I was forced to watch Ben "No-Talent" Affleck and Bruce Willis attempt to save the day.

Anybody who says that this movie was good needs to be sent to a medical facility and have their head examined.

Rating:
Summary: Top Form Popcorn Flick!!
Review: As far as blockbuster movies go, this one was A LOT of fun.

I read one review from a reviewer who was annoyed that so many people rated things as a '5' when that top rating should be reserved for movies or CDs etc, that we'd all still be talking about 50 years from now. I disagree. Ratings are here to give us a rough idea of how good something is in the scope of today, not in the scope of half a century.

That being said, Armageddon earns a four in my book, and for several reasons. Enough people have reiterated the plot so I won't go into that. As for the movie as a whole, yes, it assumes you're looking for a good time and not a real end-of-the-world, religious allegory. But the point that a lot of this movie's bashers are forgetting to take into account is that the movie knows this and does not try to be anything else. It goes all out (WAY to the extreme) to have fun, and for this film, it works. It's big, it's loud, it's grandiose - and it wouldn't have worked any other way. The only reason I take off a star is b/c, yeah, granted, it's definitely not Oscar material (not that the Academy always picks the most deserving films anyway) and the dialogue could have been a little better. And the shot were we get a close look at Affleck's full mouth of capped, sparkling white teeth is really disturbing.

For a summer flick - and taking into consideration how much time of the movie's two hours was spent either in a space shuttle or in an action scene - the film does quite a better than average job of at least TRYING to give just about each character a little bit of dimension, which I appreciated. And the effects are great, that goes without saying.

But my fav. part of the film was the score - it still gets me every time when the scene with the president's speech comes on and the drillers are getting on the shuttle. Yeah, it's cliched, overdone, and cheesy but who cares? And the scene where Harry is talking to Grace right before he's about to make the ultimate sacrifice? Let's just put it this way - last summer, I didn't go to summer school and I had so little to do, I just watched tv all day. My movie of choice was always Armageddon and even though I ended up watching it maybe more than 30 times back to back, I cried every time.

This movie is one of my secret guilty pleasures along with ID4 (which other ppl are coincidently putting down for lack of intelligence, but I thought did a great job for what it was supposed to do) and whenever I want to give my brain a break and just have some fun, a good laugh, and an exhilarating ride, I pop it into the VCR.

"Get OFF...the...nuclear...warhead." <~ line delivered with a completely straight face. HILARIOUS!! My brother and I still crack up.

Oh, and Liv Tyler was absolutely gorgeous.

Rating:
Summary: Houston, YOU'VE got a REAL problem!
Review: A crew of roughnecks, deep-sea drillers who can find the merest amounts of anything in the least accessible of spaces on earth, must now save the world from a monster-sized Asteroid less than 2 weeks away from striking Earth. The script of "Armageddon" attacks the threatening rock with the idea of landing the roughnecks and nuclear weapons onto the rock itself. Only when planted as deep as 800 feet below the rock's surface - accessible only by the wonder drill machine pioneered by Bruce Willis's character, will the nuke be able to destroy the rock. Besides the expected problems - that just getting to the rock will require sneaking past a murderous screen of smaller asteroid fragments the bigger rock carries around like a private asteroid belt, that getting to the fault will require drilling through metals and minerals never encountered on earth and facinf deadly pockets of trapped steam - will be the roughnecks themselves, led by Bruce Willis and staffed by guys like AJ (Ben Affleck) and Rockhound (Steve Buscemi). (They're geniuses, but like Rockhound chose drilling because it gives them a chance to use their intellects and lots of explosives).

"Armageddon" is a better flick than critics - guys who complain about "popcorn movies" and who like to diss this flick as another testosterone-filled Bruckheimer/Simpson production - give it credit for. The action is relentless, but you never get punch drunk, and the typical macho characters - tough generals, brilliant scientists and a patriarchal president who looks inspired by FDR (not unlike the guy who played the president in "The Rock") - are never as heroic as the rebel-roughnecks who save the Earth. Though "Armageddon" relies on good special FX (which are actually spectacular) so do lots of other flicks which were nowhere near as good. (I saw this flick back-to-back with "Wing Commander"; which flick do you think I should have seen first?) Though a lot of lit looks like an extended music video or a commercial for armed services recruiters (complete with a Thunderbirds fly-over) the script never loses its narrative (something you can't say for the extended Depeche Mode video they turned into (Alien3") The movie never leaves you behind, even though there will be long stretches where you'll probably have no idea what's going on. Ofcourse you'll want to see this in DVD.

Rating:
Summary: A "Rock" of a good time!
Review: With a sudden bame, blast and boom! The load sound efx burst into your ears to the impact of where you can't take it. One of the most commercial Jerry Bruckheimer films ever and opened doors for Michael Bay for future jobs. Bay,Known for better movies like "the Rock" or not so great movies as "Pearl Harbor" this movie is a whorle of his great mixture in lots of action. In previous films Michael Bay has proven he can make an excellent action movie ,but when the script fails to depict charactorization and plot the film has only one thing to holds its weight on... Its humor and its action. Bruce Wills is fun to see him agian in the genre that made him a Hollywood superstar. Ben Affleck has his moments as well This movie is worth watching for a good time just if you don't ask for too much of it.

Rating:
Summary: Bruce Willis back in sweaty vest mode! Yeeha!
Review: The third Michael Bay/Jerry Bruckheimer collaboration, Armageddon sees Bruce Willis back in sweaty vest mode
in this spectacular sci fi asteroid action fest. And while this does have it's flaws, it's still a cracking high-octane film filled with action and humour. Ben Affleck, Billy Bob Thornton and Steve Buscemi are good make a great supporting cast and add some well-timed humour.

The visuals and FX are fantastic and Bay's direction is thankfully lees frenzied than his previous films Bad Boys (1992) and The Rock (1995). Silly and jingoinistic in parts, it's still a great action film as only Bruckheimer could deliver. Enjoy.

Rating:
Summary: No anamorphic version? For shame!
Review: Although I think the movie is an over-loud, completely illogical and fairly disorienting piece of Hollywood claptrap, as far as big Summer blockbusters go it's hard to beat Armageddon. But I wanted to add a large, hairy and potentially sales-limiting aside to all the other reviews. If you're upgrading to a widescreen TV thinking this DVD will showcase the new technological wonders of prograssive scan and 16x9 flat screens you'll be sorely disappointed when you find that there is no anamorphic version on this disc. That's right, friends, even with all the other extras, they couldn't be bothered to include the one feature that truly showcases the cinematography and special effects (which are, let's face it, this film's halmarks cuz it sure ain't the acting and script). On a widescreen TV, Criterion's Armageddon provides black bars above, below and side to side yielding a postcard view of the "big screen" action.