"I thought I hit Hell about six months ago in a Honolulu bar… it doesn’t compare to this." |
This delicate quote from the contents of this DVD basically sums up exactly how I feel, although I’ve not hit rock bottom in a Honolulu bar before this. There are so many clichés and garbage lines in this thing I was in amazement that a producer would be willing to pour money into it. It’s shit, people.
This dude Gabriel Wingfield has just created the world’s first automated pilot program that can do everything from taxiing to landing and serving peanuts. When the prototype crashes and burns with two top pilots behind the controls he is fired.
Cut to six months later when the second prototype is up and running. Using his formidable hacking potential Wingfield hacks into the program and holds the company to ransom for his revenge. However, a little girl from down the hall in his sparse apartment block has made friends with him and when she is bitten by a spider, she is taken to hospital. With all planes in Seattle grounded, the vaccine is trying to get to the sick little girl and this connection might be just the thing the company guys need to find Wingfield and bring the plane down safely.
This plot looks like it was scribbled on a cereal box on the way to the pitch. It’s flimsy and the spider connection is truly weak. Especially when considering that Daniel Wingfield is Australian and the spider is the Sydney Funnel Web spider that somehow made it to America with him and lives in a corner of his rat’s nest apartment. Then it goes down the vent system to bite the little girl in her own apartment. Shyeah, right.
The lines all resemble that p.o.s. at the head of this review and the performances don’t even do what they can with those cheesy lines. There’s even a sex scene crammed in with a gratuitous shot of boobies and the hero of the piece is a washed-up alcoholic in love with the pilot. There’s CG animation of the airplane in flight too, and this is pretty average at best. All round this looks like it was made in about an hour by a bunch of people who weren’t paid much and couldn’t give a shit about the production anyway.
Please don’t throw your money away. It sounds much better on the sleeve than it actually is. However, there’s still something more appealing about a really, really bad movie than an average film, believe it or not. At least with a piece of crap like this there are laughs, even if they are unintentional. The Australian accent here is absolutely hilarious. If we all sound like this, I’m surprised any of us even open our mouths to foreigners at all. Wingfield even calls the boss ‘you slimy bugger!’ when he gets the sack. I’ve never heard that expression and I’ve lived in Australia for all of my life. I don’t even leave to go to the toilet.
Well, for a telemovie (surely) this looks as good as a 2001 film should look. The aspect ratio of 1.78:1 features anamorphic enhancement and the colour is fairly good. I think this low budget affair has been shot to video by the look of it and it does alright, though it’s certainly nothing to get excited about.
It’s alroight maaaaate!
A sterling Dolby Digital stereo offering does everything it’s supposed to here. There’s no trouble hearing the cast trip over the wooden script, although every Aussie inflection is both humourous and sometimes so strained as to be verbally confusing. Content too, maaaaate.
The music is a pathetic mixture of late ‘80s v. early ‘90s synthesiser riffs and generic elevator-like muzak that appears to have taken composer Ken Harrison approximately 15 minutes to compose from rehearsed piano bar DJ shit.
Oh, yeah, it’s a ripper maaaaate!
My Aussie friends, I thoroughly recommend moving along and skipping even looking at the case of this. It’s junk. It’s a coaster to put under yer Fosters maaaaate.
Instead, find a film with a decent Aussie accent… like, erm…