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Pandorum (2009)

Director: Christian Alvart

Time Out rating

Average user rating

5 reviews

Movie review

From Time Out London

‘From the producers of “Resident Evil” ’: words to strike fear into the heart of sci-fi fans. However, with talented German fanboy Christian Alvart (‘Antibodies’) in charge of the dark matter, the dystopian premise is deftly set up, while the denouement pulls off not one but two neat twists.

Two astronauts, Lieutenant Payton (Dennis Quaid) and Corporal Bower (Ben Foster), awake from hyper-sleep in a confused state. As memories of their Noah’s Ark-style mission return, they find that cannibalistic human-mutants are on the ship. As are two other humans, scientist-turned-savage Nadia and fighting machine Manh. As the ship’s generator threatens to crash and tension rises, the survivors suffer cabin fever and symptoms of Pandorum – a condition that induces hallucinations, amorality and delusions of power. Alvart achieves a strong sense of scale, but characters and ideas are lost amid a mess of fight scenes that, oddly, look like outtakes from ‘The Descent’.

Author: Nigel Floyd 2009-09-29 13:53:13

Time Out London Issue 2041: 1-7 October, 2009

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User reviews of this film

_Matt_1977_ said...

Posted on Oct 15 2009 16:58 This film tries to be clever and fails. I watched it directly after District 9 and was disappointed as I felt watching this reasonably entertaining film was a come-down after the heights of the much better District 9.
Having said that, in fairness I felt that on its own merits this was a reasonably well-done and entertaining film, albeit not terribly original, not least in its "twist".

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steve said...

Posted on Oct 08 2009 19:50 I agree with the comment before me. The movie does what you expect no? It scares you, a few jumps and the necessary lashings of gore. I'm not sure why it has got such a negative reaction. ok it's no alien but what do you want???

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Michael Mabon said...

Posted on Oct 06 2009 00:35 Haha, i thought this film was top. Really enjoyed, sort of like "28 day's later in space" I don't share my friends comments i found it very entertaining, funny in some bits that probaly weren't supposed to be but was a good yarn and i'm sure i jumprd at a few bits!!! haha, I really enjoyed it and i guess that's what its all about!! No??

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roger rabbit said...

Posted on Oct 04 2009 11:50 The line on the cinema poster for Alien was " In space no one can hear you sc ream" Well after buying a ticket for this visual S*** everyone within 6 miles will hear you scream. Utter bollocks plus so dark you cant really see or care whats going on ! Mr Q was bad enough in GI Joe this is 10 times worse ,he must be short of cash,another one to leave on blockbusters shelf !

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usman khawaja said...

Posted on Oct 03 2009 03:59 some astronauts wake up in a disoriented state on a spaceship which looks like a cheap imitation of the alien craft and are hunted by some cannibal mutants while they discover that earth has disappeared due to some disaster ,the acting is total pandemonium and the special effects are appallingly bad ,while the mutants are hilariously amusing with action that is worst than even inferior bollywood flicks ,and surprisingly dennis quaid is just as bad as the rest of the package too ,this is a real space disaster that eclipses the apocalypse that destroyed the human planet .

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