Empire's Pandorum Movie Review

Pandorum
Dennis Quaid in a sci-fi space horror

Plot
Lieutenant Payton (Dennis Quaid) and Corporal Bower (Ben Foster) wake up from cryogenic suspension on an apparently deserted spaceship, with no memory of who they are, what their mission is or what the noises coming from the belly of the ship could be.

Review

Astronauts Payton (Dennis Quaid) and Bower (Ben Foster), serving on a space ark which is conveying the last Earth folks to a fresh new planet, come out of cryo-sleep suffering from partial amnesia.

The ship is malfunctioning, and degenerate body-pierced mutant cannibals are running wild, so Bower takes a perilous journey through dark tunnels to fire up the reactors while Payton argues with a pessimist mystery man (Cam Gigandet) in the control room.

Pandorum is a hodge-podge of familiar sci-fi stuff, which feels as if it were adapted from a computer game – it’s a Paul W.S. Anderson production, directed by Christian Alvart (Case 39) – and spends so much time in the dark, with irritating jittery edits and indistinct action, that it barely flickers into life when all its mysteries are resolved.

Verdict

Reviewed by Kim Newman

Write Your Review
To write your review please login or register.

Your Reviews

Average user rating for Pandorum

RE: Awful
L: Rgirvan44 I didn't hate the film but felt there were some pretty big flaws. 1. The editing, in particular the creatures. They looked grea, why the crazy speed editing when they were running/. 2. The lighting - the set design looked great, but a lot of it was in pitch blackness. 3.man "warrior" characters - they looked like they came from Xena: Warrior Princess. There is nothing here that you haven't seen before and the twist is so so obvious. I suspect there was ... More

Posted by HandBanana at 16:06, 31 May 2011 \| Report This Post



Lol
Write a review on it on my blog about the religious subtext. http://onedeviousbastard.blogspot.com/2011/07/movie-ana lysis-symbolism-in-pandorum.html btw, Event Horizon and The Descent didn't have any new ideas. ... More


Posted by HandBanana at 15:36, 31 May 2011 \| Report This Post



RE:
L: HuwTJ Nowhere near as bad as the review would suggest. Could be because it made me think of playing Dead Space loads though. Much better than new Indy or Superman Retiurns ... More


Posted by TheGreenPlanet at 15:37, 19 April 2011 \| Report This Post



RE: Pandorum
Awful, when people complain about Michael Bay's fast cutting making it impossible to understand what's going on I'll assume they're referring to this film. The only thing I liked was the last shot. If they started the film here and dropped all the zombie/monster stuff there would have been potential for something good. ... More


Posted by Tech_Noir at 07:05, 08 April 2011 \| Report This Post




I must have rented the most vanilla disc ever from LoveFilm - film plays and there isn't even a menu never mind something as fancy as a commentary. As for the movie? Could have been better, could have been worse. Trying to go for a sci-fi Descent vibe but I wasn't buying it. ... More


Posted by RogueElement at 22:03, 10 May 2010 \| Report This Post



Made Hellraiser 4 seem tolerable
Avoid. Watch the Descent, Alien, even Event Horizon instead. And if you've seen them already just watch any one of them again. Trust me. This is just an incoherent mish mash of bits from better films only done badly. ... More


Posted by strangeone at 00:50, 27 April 2010 \| Report This Post



Rip off
Blatantly ripps off the Descent and Event horizon ... More


Posted by Shambino at 18:30, 21 April 2010 \| Report This Post



Pandorum
I thought this was a pretty good sci-fi movie, dark, well acted, decent action, good characters and a great ending. I agree with the reviewer that it's taken bits and pieces off other movies but frankly so many films do that it's not exactly a dealbreaker. I liked the fact that it wasn't as straightforward as humans vs mutants - there was the flight officer's mission, the survivors (both good and bad) the mutants, and the effects of Pandorum all playing a signifcant role in the story and ... More

Posted by Fluke Skywalker at 13:31, 19 March 2010 \| Report This Post




I thought it was alright. Inoffensive way to spend a couple of hours ... More


Posted by chris wootton at 09:29, 23 February 2010 \| Report This Post



Not Orignal But Watchable.
Pandorum has that feel of Ailen, Event Horizon and the deadly creepy Dead Space. In a empty eeire spaceship, find a way to get out while running for your life from the terriying monsters that lurk in the darkness. Not really orignal plotting there. But it kept on going, never lost that edge of your seat feel and some jump out moments. Okay, it's not the best film I have seen and copies a hell lot of other movies that have made that horror feel terrifying to see. I do recommend Pandorum if you li... More


Posted by joanna likes films at 09:44, 21 February 2010 \| Report This Post




got this on disc last night and found it to be alot better than I had expected. I was looking for a sci fi slasher and this put some brains to it. Some interesting ideas and a shit load better than any Star Trek or Star Wars franchise I have been subjected to. I can see this film falling in to the ranks of Equilibrium as a solid underated work of the gerne. ... More


Posted by Geosolus at 12:06, 23 January 2010 \| Report This Post



hmm...
...this sounds a bit like System Shock 2, doesn't it..? ... More


Posted by amerelium at 03:06, 25 October 2009 \| Report This Post



hmm...
...this sounds a bit like System Shock 2, doesn't it..? ... More


Posted by amerelium at 03:06, 25 October 2009 \| Report This Post



RE: pretty watchable
L: spamandham "Wasn't Dead Space a rip-off of Event Horizopn only ten times more derivative?" The DS storyline was considerably superior and better executed than EH. None of either of them was original though. sp; Really? ... More

Posted by kenada_woo at 14:35, 21 October 2009 \| Report This Post



RE: pretty watchable
"Wasn't Dead Space a rip-off of Event Horizopn only ten times more derivative?" The DS storyline was considerably superior and better executed than EH. None of either of them was original though. ... More

Posted by spamandham at 14:00, 21 October 2009 \| Report This Post



pretty watchable
Meh, wasn't that bad i thought; certainly worth another 'star' by emp standards. 67% ... More

Posted by spamandham at 13:58, 21 October 2009 \| Report This Post



Missed Potential...rum
2 out of 5? I don’t think it was quite that bad although probably only a 2.5 out of 5 if half marks were being dished out. It starts off reasonably well and the tension builds nicely. Ok so it’s a dead ringer for various other ‘I’m in space on big ship with a Xenomorph’ flicks but to be honest, to emulate greats such as Alien and Event Horizon isn’t so daft is it? I will say that I half expected Rimmer to appear and call Quaid a smeg head on more than on... More


Posted by moviesaccording2lard at 19:18, 11 October 2009 \| Report This Post



RE:
I rather enjoyed it. Sure, there wasn't anything that original but Foster and Quaid were good in their respective roles and I thought the whole production design was awesome, though that it porbalby looked that way as they were able to hide any flaws in the dark. The 'monsters' have been cited as simply being ripped off from The Descent, but you could call the whole film 'The Descent in Space' if you were feeling suitably lazy. Sure their origins were quickly glossed over but I thought th... More

Posted by Timon at 18:52, 11 October 2009 \| Report This Post



RE: Awful
L: kenada_woo L: Deviation L: kenada_woo L: mackey I don't think the sci-fi channel is the best place to judge the genre UTB. As you say, the stuff they show on there is almost total drivel. Unfortunately 'Pandorum' would not look out of place amongst it's programming. It's a truly awful film which liberally 'borrows' ideas from several far better sci-fi/horror films and recycles them into a murky, mundane mess - gloomy lighting is no substitute for a... More

Posted by Deviation at 00:51, 09 October 2009 \| Report This Post



RE:
Wasn't Dead Space a rip-off of Event Horizopn only ten times more derivative? ... More

Posted by Deviation at 00:48, 09 October 2009 \| Report This Post




Nowhere near as bad as the review would suggest. Could be because it made me think of playing Dead Space loads though. ... More


Posted by HuwTJ at 23:44, 08 October 2009 \| Report This Post



RE: what a shame...
L: hampstead bandit anyone say this was awful? would not say awful, but VERY confused, its a jumbled film and certainly not one I will be adding to my film collection 2/5 is about right in my opinion, I saw Surrogates the week before and enjoyed watching that and found it thought provoking in places Pandorum was not really enjoyable, and the only thoughts it provoked were "???" and "What the hell is going on?" OSSIBLE SPOILERS!!!!! Personally I really liked ... More


Posted by genejoke at 10:22, 08 October 2009 \| Report This Post



Pandorum
OK so there's not an original bone in this film's body (feels like a cross between Event Horizon, Aliens and The Descent) but it's entertaining enough stuff and not deserving of only 2 stars. Agree it's way too dark at times which makes it difficult to make out what's going on sometime but apart from that I quite enjoyed. I was disappointed a bit though as I was expecting it to be more of a psychological sci-fi horror type film which the first trailer kind of made it look like. A missed opportun... More


Posted by trueborndjross at 08:53, 08 October 2009 \| Report This Post



Pandora's Box, maybe......
Saw it today, and didn't think it was as bad as some of the comments / reviews have mentioned. It certainly is a bit disjointed, and obviously borrows some scenes from other classic Sci Fi Films ( Alien, Event Horizon etc ) but there was a good storyline in there somewhere, I'm sure......... ... More


Posted by n13roy at 23:23, 07 October 2009 \| Report This Post



Pandora's Box, maybe......
Saw it today, and didn't think it was as bad as some of the comments / reviews have mentioned. It certainly is a bit disjointed, and obviously borrows some scenes from other classic Sci Fi Films ( Alien, Event Horizon etc ) but there was a good storyline in there somewhere, I'm sure......... ... More


Posted by n13roy at 23:23, 07 October 2009 \| Report This Post



Next Page

PandorumDennis Quaid in a sci-fi space horror

Pandorum
Dennis Quaid in a sci-fi space horror