Blu Ray Disks: Pandorum [Blu-ray]

Pandorum [Blu-ray] Review

Pandorum,released Sept/09,gives us an interesting and different twist in the Sci-Fi genre.The cast is generally confined to a few people at a time on screen and the film manages to capture and maintain an all-pervading atmosphere of oppression and danger,throughout its run.
The story is set in 2247 and the Earth has gone to hell in a hand basket.It has sent a large spaceship full of new colonists(some 16,000 souls)to an Earth-like world some 40 light years away called Tanis,to resettle and populate.However something has gone terribly wrong during the flight.A Corp.Bower awakens from hyper sleep to find that he is seemingly alone on the ship the Elysium,in an ante room cut off from the ships bridge.Just as he regains some of his senses another stasis tube opens and out is ejected one Lieut.Payton.He is as confused as Bower due to their extended hyper sleep and they come to the conclusion that they must regain access to the bridge in order to fully reassess their situation,whatever it is.
Bower elects to crawl through the above duct work in order to hopefully reach the bridge.However his claustrophobic antics in the ducts send him crashing to a grate,through that and then onto the floor;not on the bridge as he'd hoped.As he inspects his surroundings he comes upon a body suspended by a wire in a long hall way.The person is alive but he is no mood to help Bower and in short order Bower discovers there is more life on the ship than this man and the lieutenant;and it is quite malevolent.They hide but Bowers new "find" is dragged away to his death by the creatures;humanoid beings that run and crawl with amazing speed and wear an exoskeleton of bones.
The farther Bower explores the ship the more creatures he encounters.In fact he manages to hook up with two other crew members along the way,a man(who speaks no English)and a woman;both are just as bewildered and terrified of their surroundings as Bower.Pieces of this mysterious puzzle slowly start to come together as the film progresses and we learn that these wild creatures roaming the ship were once humans like themselves.It seems that some genetic enhancement in their cryo-tube feeder lines which was supposed to help kick start life on the new planet has somehow mutated many of the colonist.Bower's memory also slowly returns to him bit by bit and he realizes that the reactor must be restarted in order to gain control of the ship properly.With this in mind he heads down to the lowest and most dangerous levels of the ship to reach it with his companions.
Lieut.Payton meanwhile has had his hands full.A young corporal has come out of a cryo pod in Bowers absence and the corporal has all the signs of pandorum;a slow build up of extreme paranoia which can lead to severe harm to those around.As he deals with the corporal he tries to guide Bower and company to the reactor.Things however deteriorate to such an extent he is over powered and forced by the corporal to eject him off the ship in a life pod.But it is only a simulation run by the lieutenant and in there the corporal stays temporarily.Back at the reactor things are touch and go.The resting area for the blood thirsty creatures is at the base of the reactor.The walkway above which leads to the reactor controls gives way under Bowers feet and he falls to another extending section of the reactor.However he must go down and walk through the creatures while they rest/sleep and climb the ladder back up to the controls.Just as he reaches the ladder the creatures wake up and pursue Bower and company.Bower manages to finally get the reactor online which disintegrates many of the creatures at its base.However it is still a mad dash back to the bridge and "safety" from those creatures still alive,and there are plenty.
The corporal that Lieut.Payton held in the pod is now out again and they are in a hand to hand struggle.Payton manages to subdue him with a tranquilizer gun,but wait.The corporal IS the lieutenant!He,suffering from pandorum himself,was responsible for ejecting around 1600 passengers early on in the flight.He re-entered a cryo sleep until awakened later to meet an unsuspecting Bower.Now Bower and the only one of two of his companions left,confront Payton.Payton opens the shield doors from the observation windows above to reveal an inky blackness with no stars.When an alien life form swims by the windows illuminating some of the surroundings,it is then they realize they are under water.The Elysium had crash landed underwater 923 years before.When a crack in the window forms during their struggle with Payton and water starts to enter,Bower and his companion enter a cryo tube and eject themselves.In short order what colonists that are left on board are also being ejected because of the hull breach.They all end up on the water surface looking across at a beautiful island with a waterfall;just waiting for them to finally begin their colonization of Tanis.
The film moves back and forth between Payton and Bowers at just the right moments.Besides the creatures,there are rarely any more than three people on the screen at one time.The claustrophobia is maintained beautifully throughout and is heightened considerably in such areas as the duct work,full of round tubing that is unforgiving and almost seems alive.The big picture as to exactly what is going on is also kept to a minimum throughout.The characters and we the viewers are kept in the dark and only given enough snippets to pique our interest just to keep things moving at the pace the director wants.So when we finally realize that the corporal and the lieutenant are one and the same and the ship is actually under water and not lost in space,the punch is considerable.Well crafted to be sure and it is what makes Pandorum the good movie it is.
Technically the film is in its' widescreen glory in its 2:35:1 a/r.The transfer is clear and crisp.Special features include three featurettes,one a behind-the-scenes,a mock flight team video for the Elysium and a Blair Witch-like video of what happened to Nadia's team.There is also the trailer,commentary and some deleted and alternate scenes.The DVD I have comes with a holographic like cover over the usual snap case.Nice.
All in all a different,likable and smart twist in the Sci Fi genre.The oppressive atmosphere the makers maintain throughout the film is wonderfully done and they leave you guessing right down to the final moments.I recommend it.

Pandorum [Blu-ray] Overview

In Pandorum, Dennis Quaid (Vantage Point, The Express) and Ben Foster (3:10 to Yuma, Alpha Dog) join Cam Gigandet (Never Back Down, Twilight), Cung Le (Tekken, Fighting), newcomer Antje Traue, and director Christian Alvart (Antibodies) to tell the terrifying story of two crew members stranded on a spacecraft who quickly – and horrifically – realize they are not alone. Two astronauts awaken in a hyper-sleep chamber aboard a seemingly abandoned spacecraft. It’s pitch black, they are disoriented, and the only sound is a low rumble and creak from the belly of the ship. They can’t remember anything: Who are they? What is their mission? With Lt. Payton (Quaid) staying behind to guide him via radio transmitter, Cpl. Bower (Foster) ventures deep into the ship and begins to uncover a terrifying reality. Slowly the spacecraft’s shocking, deadly secrets are revealed…and the astronauts find their own survival is more important than they could ever have imagined.

Pandorum [Blu-ray] Specifications

Largely dismissed as yet another Alien carbon, the science-fiction/horror hybrid Pandorum exceeds the limits of that critique with an agreeable mix of atmospherics and high-voltage scares. Ben Foster and Dennis Quaid--two consistently watchable actors, and both well used here--are top-billed as a pair of space travelers who awake from lengthy hibernation with no idea who they are or how they got aboard a vast and seemingly empty spacecraft. Their exploration of the ship uncovers not only a handful of fellow humans, among them martial arts champ Cung Le and French scientist/requisite eye candy Antje Traue, but a host of feral mutants with unpleasant designs on them. Director Christian Alvert, who gained international acclaim among genre viewers with his thriller Antibodies, keeps viewers engaged and unsettled with shadow-steeped cinematography and elaborately creepy production design, though his own attention span, which can be charitably described as blink and you'll miss it, obscures the clashes between the human and monster cast. However, Alvert has a few twists up his sleeve for the finale--one inspired, the other, less so--which not only helps to smooth over any of Pandorum's rougher edges, but also indicates that he's a genre director to watch. --Paul Gaita

Stills from Pandorum (Click for larger image)