Supernova

Tia Carrere, Peter Fonda

At first I was wondering why this didn't look like other movies and why it kept having these abrupt fades every 20 minutes, until I finally realized - DUH! it's a made-for-TV movie. OK - that clued me in to the repetition of the shots of the sun burning and the various subplots that seemed to have no point.

Once clued in to that, I settled in for a slightly interesting time. But this bears further discussion on the media: the relative advantages and disadvantages to these "brothers of film" - that of the theatrical movie and the television movie. The theatrical has basically an hour&1/2 to 2 hours to tell the tale, leave you emotionally WOWED (so you won't demand your 10 bucks back!) and get you out in time for the next showing; the made for TV movie has to keep you from channel surfing while also convincing the advertisers that you will watch over the course of three nights. Leads to different styles of storytelling.

Do I think Supernova was effective at this? I don't know - I watched it as a DVD movie, which as I said, when you're primed for one and get the other, it's a bit of a shake up. Overall, the story went pretty well, once you suspend your disbelief so much that you can accept that the sun can go supernova in a week.

Which is impossible, by the way.

But other than that, there are some good characters - it has an interesting take on what people will do at the end of the world (they will party like it's well . . . beyond 1999 - which I prefer to complete riots and fires and destruction). There, of course, is the military, which has built an underground city to ride out Armageddon (I swear I expected to see Dr Strangelove around every corner in that complex . . . and if you don't understand the reference, then shame on you! - go rent DR STRANGELOVE RIGHT NOW!!! - That movie should be in the Top 10 of every person's list of Movies You Must See Before You Die)

Anyway, gotta go - sorry that's all I had to say for it, except that it was sweet to watch Henry Fonda as a tired scientist fall in love with a woman on a tropical island at the end of the world and have them sweetly holding hands watching the sun over the ocean and then be killed by a fireball that vaporizes them right on the steps of their hut.

Sweet.

VG