Wednesday, April 19, 2023

Fallout (1999)

What a great idea for a film, though the execution leaves a lot to be desired.

We are in the future (well for this film anyway, 2015 is the past now). Russia have invaded a former Soviet country (oh that sounds familiar). However, despite being from the country being invaded Federov (Frank Zagarino) is still going to command a space shuttle mission on the behalf of the Russians to the international space station (or a more advanced version which conveniently has artificial gravity). Also going on the mission is Amanda (Teri Ann Lynn) who is going to fix the space station's computer.

However, on the station things soon go wrong. Federov seizes control of the station and also a Russian nuclear attack satellite constellation. He tells Russia that they must withdraw from his homeland or he will start firing these nuclear satellites at US cities! The US responds by sending maverick pilot Hendricks (Daniel Baldwin) aboard an experimental new space ship, which has yet to make a successful flight...

The story is great though the budget and execution is unfortunately not up to the job. The acting is nearly as flimsy as some of the sets do, one of which makes Mission Control look like it's been relocated to a caravan. The action mostly consists of firing assault rifles on a space station. This does not seem the wisest thing to do to me...