Supernova (2000)

Director: Walter Hill
Starring: James Spader, Peter Facinelli, Robin Tunney

Synopsis:
A medical rescue ship follows a distress call, but they find something unexpected waiting for them.

Impressions:
TVTropes lists this as a dueling movie with Pitch Black. I'd say it's more accurately a dueling movie with Event Horizon that was late to the party (a good two years in development hell after principal photography wrapped will do that). This movie has quite a reputation for being terrible. There was all sorts of wrangling in the studio and director Walter Hill disowned it (though I still credit him above instead of using the neo-Alan Smithee pseudonym Thomas Lee). Indeed it's not a good movie, but I won't go so far as to call it terrible. I actually thought James Spader and Peter Facinelli were pretty good in this. There's some wasted potential here, but as far as space horror goes, it's passable. The effects are so-so, about what you can expect from turn of the century CG. There's a surprising amount of nudity for a PG-13 film. I realize the MPAA is in no way consistent, but I thought it was notable. This was originally pitched as Hellraiser in space, but if you want to see the real Hellraiser in space (and I don't mean Hellraiser: Bloodline), go watch Event Horizon. If you want to see a mixed bag with some good ideas not terribly well executed, give this a shot.

Rating:
50/50