Dr. Venkman Reviews: The Day the Earth Stood Still

I consider myself a hard core sci-fi film fan. I love the idea of other alien races in another galaxy having intergalactic wars and that in the whole big scheme of things they end up finding themselves on our planet ready to battle it out or even try and save us from another evil threat. In the case of ‘The Day the Earth Stood Still' we are that evil threat, and if we survive the earth dies because we are the ones killing it slowly, but if we die the earth survives because then there wont be anyone to kill it. It's plain as day that this is first and foremost an environmental film, they leave nothing open for interpretation. This movie, ‘Inconvenient Truth', and ‘The Happening' should be sold in an environmental movie box set.That's pretty much the story. Klaatu comes to earth to see if the human race is worth saving, if not he will destroy us. And as you can see in the trailer he lets loose the little nano bots to eat away everything that exists on our planet. So at first he obviously didn't like what he saw, and to tell you the truth I didn't like what I saw either.



‘The Day the Earth Stood Still' was actually quite a boring film. The market it is an effects driven action type sci-fi movie, and all of the action sequences in the film are shown in the movies trailer so if that all you want to see from this movie then watch the trailer. I thought at least the movie would be fun to watch! But no. If you are looking for an interesting story then you won't find it in this film. It is actually a pretty hollow film, you would be better off watching the original film because at least it makes you think.

I could tell the filmmakers were trying to stay away from any retro type look and feel, they wanted to make a serious film with serious subject matter and it just didn't work for me.



The special effects were decent but the designs sucked. I wasn't big on these glowing spherical balls, spacecrafts would have been much better touch. GORT was a huge disappointment, I did not like his design at all, and it looked silly to me. It reminded me of those cheap rubber bendable toys.

Lets talk about the acting in the film. Keanu Reeves as Klaatu was perfect casting. He did what he does best and that's act like Keanu Reeves. Jennifer Connelly as Helen looked great and was fine actress. Kathy Bates as Regina was absolutely awful. How do you bring a great actress down to a crappy level? Give them a B.S. role with B.S. dialogue. John Cleese as Professor Barnhardt was the best part of this movie and he was in it a cool five minutes. He was that pointless character in the movie that gives a little bit of enlightenment. Then there is little Jaden Smith as Jacob, this movie proves he is one of the worst child actors in Hollywood, I know for a fact they could have found a better kid to play that role but hey, it's Will Smiths son, what are you gonna do? Say no? Here's what I think as going on there, the people on set were afraid to tell him he was doing something wrong, its like the director was afraid to direct him. Maybe they didn't want to hurt his feeling or maybe Will Smith was on the set and you don't want to correct Jaden in front of his dad. Who knows, all I do know is that they could have got someone else, or Jaden could have been directed better.



The best scene of the movie was a scene between Klaatu and Professor Barnhardt when they first met. Bach is playing in the background. There is a chalkboard with some kind of mathematical equation on it, Klaatu walks over and begins making correction to it, Barnhardt walks in and joins in with Klaatu as the solve the problem together. It was like if two people were to sit down at a piano and tag team Flight of the Bumblebee. It was kind of a poetic scene.



The audience's reaction of the film didn't seem very positive either. I don't think ‘The day the Earth Stood Still' is worth seeing in the theater. It's the type of movie that is fun to rag on afterwards, or even during the movie, like the people sitting behind me did. I asked my friend afterward "We're you bored?" He replied in his best Keanu Reeves voice "My body was."

Yeah, so I didn't like it. I thought it would be much better than what I got.

Whatever you decide to go see, remember to enjoy your time at the movies.