It's a lazy Saturday and I'm at home, not expecting to find anything worth watching on the tube when I stumbled upon this movie. I have to say that I was very surprised by this film. It's really pretty good. The problem with a lot of sci-fi pictures today is that they fail to create a believable fantasy world. Bad sci-fi flicks suffer from gaping plot holes or scientific impossibilities that anyone who paid attention to 4th grade science could figure out. This film doesn't suffer from such ailments. The writer and director painted a believable picture of a future where humans live on Earth, Mars, and mine the moons of Saturn and interplanetary shipping of cargo is a high pay / high risk job. The two lead characters awake from hyper-sleep 10 months past their scheduled date only to discover that the ship has been ravaged by the two members of the previous shift... both of whom are missing. The suspense starts from there continues to build for remainder of the film. It was pretty suspenseful flick. A lot of that is due to excellent acting jobs by Missy Crider (Frailty, Powder, the TV series The Others) and Jason London (The Rage: Carrie 2, Safe Passage) and a script by Carla Jean Wagner that didn't sacrifice accuracy for an abundant amount of official sounding techno-babble. Put the acting and writing together and you actually end up caring about the lead characters. If this movie a larger budget for props and special effects, it could have ranked up there with films like Alien, or Blade Runner. The ending isn't typical, which only adds to the class of this film. The only problem I can see with the flick are the external CGI shots of the ships... they are good for television, but still obviously generated by computer. Regardless, I still recommend this film. Enjoy!
Review of Alien Cargo
