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The Core (2003) More at IMDbPro »

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Anthropocentric Spin, 14 August 2005

Author: dunmore_ego from Los Angeles, California

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

I want to hurt this movie. Like it hurt me.

But first, I need to hurt the puerile-minded fans of this schlock: Any ratiocinating fools who entreat those of us with a modicum of intelligence to "sit back, relax and enjoy this entertainment" do not realize that we who rail against bogus "science" in movies of this ilk, do so NOT because of bogus science per se, but because of the INCONSISTENT bogus science. We may not boast Geophysics degrees, nor do we aspire to atom-splitting scientific accuracy – we just want CONSISTENCY!

Example 1: If your movie maintains that pigeons use the earth's electromagnetic field for "long-distance navigation", why show pigeons disoriented whilst tooling around the few hundred feet of Trafalgar Square?

Example 2: If your movie cites Real Science to explain the impossibility of generating enough energy to start the planet's core re-spinning, why not establish that it takes that same impossible amount of energy to STOP the core in the first place? More on this later.

This movie has less "science" in it than Star Wars – and Star Wars has NO science in it.

Furthermore, note that "implausible" = fiction; "impossible" = fantasy. A laser disintegrating rock to nothingness: implausible. Humans sustaining diamond-crushing pressure in the earth's mantle - no matter WHAT they're wearing, let alone wafer-thin spacesuits: impossible. Throughout the film, Impossibility outweighing Implausibility means this is Science FANTASY, not Science "Fiction", so cease associating it with a once-legitimate term.

When physics knowledge was at a groundling stage, scientifically-inept tales like "Journey to the Center of the Earth" were acceptable, but these days, even the common rabble are well-versed in general physics, so it is INEXCUSABLE that knowledge be so denigrated, ignored and subjugated to the inadequacies of feeble-minded technicians with big budgets, who promulgate ANTI-knowledge with their idiotic product…

Movie opens with a guy who looks like Peter Gallagher sans Eyebrows dropping dead at a board meeting – so begins a series of events that establish that the earth's core has inexplicably stopped spinning, causing electromagnetic anomalies. So scientists must drill down and re-start the spin with The Universal Solvent – nukes.

But the spin begins long before they take the plunge…

At a militia symposium, geophysicist Aaron Eckhart (your average "biscuit-thrower" college professor: disheveled hair, attire and lifestyle; upon arriving home, throws biscuit to dog which has no name – Hollywood stereotype created by Mel Gibson in "Lethal Weapon"), cites Physics 101, yet none of the generals seem to have even a sixth-grade education, as they stare dismayed at his demo of burning a peach with a spray-can, to illustrate – get this! – how the Sun would burn the earth were it to lose its electromagnetic covering. The stupidity meter could go no lower at that point.

Movies of this ilk are constructed around one or two thrilling sequences upon which the burden of the storyline is draped uncomfortably – such a scene was the introduction to grotesquely gorgeous Hilary Swank, as her crew emergency-land Shuttle Endeavour in the LA Aqueduct. The movie's pitch was ALL ABOUT sonic-booming over Dodger Stadium and navigating through overpass bridges like technofied T-Birds from Grease. Magnificently-staged, the thrill meter hit climax – consequently, it was all downhill from there.

Stanley Tucci's suavely turtle-necked character is simply to insult Carl Sagan. Ironic that we meet Tucci exiting his Einstein seminars, even whilst this movie flings caca in the face of Einstein's most rigorous theorem (E=mc squared).

Tchéky Karyo, as Frenchman Serge, is the only likable character. Of the admittedly talented cast, his performance alone is so poignant that we're truly saddened to see him die. (His end was pre-ordained; he was, after all, French.)

Let's play Meet The Stereotype: gorgeously grotesque D.J. Qualls as computer-hacker, Rat. Isn't his "unlikely hero" character one of those rootless, amoral beings who make our modern online lives unbearable with viruses and identity theft and their wholly unnecessary existence? The sooner they are eradicated, rather than pedestalled, the better.

There's the Square-Jawed American Pilot (least-known of the principals – ergo, first to die); Delroy Lindo, Token Black Dude; That Guy from Six Feet Under and Alfre Woodward as the preposterously miscast Flight Director. One keeps expecting F. Murray Abraham in a movie this bad. (The actors did their best, but the blathering catastrophe of the script gave them no quarter.)

Lindo constructs their drilling craft with a substance called Unobtainium (stop that laughing in back!), which, he tells us, converts heat and pressure to energy, so the deeper it gets, the stronger it gets….er, I think the misinformed "scientist" MEANT to say that energy in the form of heat and pressure is converted to MASS by the Unobtainium. (Remember that "E=mc2" thingy?) Was the "science consultant" a G.E.D.? – and more importantly, may I book some time to slap him uncontrollably?

The SCRIPT was made of Unobtainium. The deeper it got, the more energy it expended in keeping us from frying in outrage.

In an Act II sequence, where everyone takes turns saying something scientifically illiterate, Tucci reveals that a man-made device, "Destiny", is responsible for the stalled core. I'll say this once: NOTHING MAN-MADE can output the amount of energy needed to stall a PLANET'S core. What part of "NOTHING MAN-MADE" don't the film-makers understand? Arrogant, anthropocentric, bacterial mites!

Conceited humans refuse to acknowledge One True Fact: THE PLANET will be fine – whether or not the core spins at all; *whether or not humans EXIST at all*. You're only "saving" it for your OWN selfish ends…

As the two surviving Attractive People are rescued, Rat cries, "The earth is healing itself!" - It was never sick, dimwit!

But I think I'M going to be…

(Movie Maniacs, visit: www.poffysmoviemania.com)

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