Armageddon (1998)

After discovering that an asteroid the size of Texas is going to impact Earth in less than a month, N.A.S.A. recruits a misfit team of deep core drillers to save the planet.

Director:

Michael Bay

Writers:

Jonathan Hensleigh (screenplay), J.J. Abrams (screenplay)

Stars:

Bruce Willis, Billy Bob Thornton, Ben Affleck

Nominated for 4 Oscars. Another 15 wins & 36 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Bruce Willis	...	Harry S. Stamper
Billy Bob Thornton	...	Dan Truman
Ben Affleck	...	A.J. Frost
Liv Tyler	...	Grace Stamper
Will Patton	...	Chick
Steve Buscemi	...	Rockhound
William Fichtner	...	Colonel Willie Sharp
Owen Wilson	...	Oscar
Michael Clarke Duncan	...	Bear
Peter Stormare	...	Lev Andropov
Ken Hudson Campbell	...	Max (as Ken Campbell)
Jessica Steen	...	Co-Pilot Jennifer Watts
Keith David	...	General Kimsey
Chris Ellis	...	Flight Director Clark
Jason Isaacs	...	Ronald Quincy

Storyline

It is just another day at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), a few astronauts were repairing a satellite until, out of nowhere, a series of asteroids came crashing into the shuttle, destroying it. These asteroids also decimated New York soon thereafter. Then, NASA discovered that there is an asteroid roughly the size of Texas heading towards the Earth, and when it does hit the Earth, the planet itself and all of its inhabitants will be obliterated, worse, the asteroid will hit the Earth in 18 days. Unfortunately, NASA's plans to destroy the asteroid are irrelevant. That is when the U.S. military decides to use a nuclear warhead to blow the asteroid to pieces. Then, scientists decide to blow the asteroid with the warhead inside the asteroid itself. The only man to do it, is an oil driller named Harry Stamper and his group of misfit drillers and geologists. As he and his drill team prepare for space excavation, the asteroid is still heading towards the Earth. When...

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Plot Keywords:

asteroid | astronaut | outer space | bomb | meteorite | 

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Taglines:

All the time in the world is all they've got.

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Genres:

Action | Adventure | Sci-Fi | Thriller

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated PG-13 for sci-fi disaster action, sensuality and brief language

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English Russian Indonesian

Release Date:

1 July 1998 (USA)

Also Known As:

Armageddon

Filming Locations:

Los Angeles Theatre - 615 S. Broadway, Downtown, Los Angeles, California, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$140,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend USA:

$36,089,972, 5 July 1998, Wide Release

Gross USA:

$201,573,391, 6 December 1998

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$553,709,788, 12 August 2012

Company Credits

Production Co:

Touchstone Pictures, Jerry Bruckheimer Films, Valhalla Motion Pictures

Technical Specs

Runtime:

151 min 153 min (director's cut)

Sound Mix:

DTS Dolby Digital SDDS

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.39 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Bruce Willis and Billy Bob Thornton appeared in Bandits (2001) and The Astronaut Farmer (2006).

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Goofs

When they are drawing straws to see who stays on the asteroid, they show AJ pulling his straw. It's the same length as the other straws shown, but when it cuts back to AJ he all of a sudden has the short straw.

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Quotes

[first lines]
[Camera shoots past the moon to slowly zoom in on the Earth]
Narrator: This is the Earth, at a time when the dinosaurs roamed a lush and fertile planet.
[From behind the camera, a giant asteroid appears, speeding towards the Earth ahead of it]
Narrator: A piece of rock just 6 miles wide changed all that.
[Blazing through the atmosphere, the asteroid impacts with a spectacular display of fire and destruction]
Narrator: It hit with the force of 10,000 nuclear weapons. A trillion tons of dirt and rock hurtled into ...

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Crazy Credits

All initial UK '12' Certificate videos came with the full promo video for Aerosmith's: "I Don't Wanna Miss A Thing" before the film started. The video only came with the limited widescreen or even more limited 'double feature' boxed video with 'The Making of Armaggedon' as a bonus video. Also some outtakes (1 per character) were featured at the very end of the credits with text underneath saying 'In loving memory of who gave his life saving our planet.' (The outtakes only came with the initial copies on video.)

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Alternate Versions

American Television Version deletes a 5-second scene of the World Trade Center, damaged and in flames, after the opening asteroid shower. In addition, a second scene of the World Trade Center Tower 2 being hit by a fragment is cut short.

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Connections

Spoofed in South Park: Casa Bonita (2003)

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Soundtracks

Wish I Were You
Written by Patty Smyth (as Patty Smyth-McEnroe) and Glen Burtnick
Performed by Patty Smyth
Courtesy of Columbia Records

User Reviews

At least it's honest

You know, looking at what people here have to say about this movie, I think there are two problems. One, some people have no tolerance for pure entertainment. Not every movie has to explore the depths of humanity, and teach us new things about ourselves. Some of the greatest movies aver hardly do that. On the other hand, there are variances in entertainment. Those who proclaim Armageddon to be the greatest action movie ever are generally those who, last summer, said the same about Con Air, and the year before, said the same about Independence Day.

Now, Armageddon is slightly better than the absolute mediocrity and "one-time-in-the-theater-but-only-with-a-big-screen-and- digital-sound" kind of summer hit that we usually see, but by two virtues only.

The first is its blunt honesty. It promises no plot, no characters, little reason to care, etc. It does promise all the visceral pleasures you can get your fill of, if you're up to it. And on that level, it aims, and hits the target with style. I wouldn't see it more than a couple times, I wouldn't buy it except to test my DVD surround setup, but I do find much of it to be decent escapist fun. And then some of it is also extremely boring.

On full-screen VHS with TV sound and the lights on, and the expectation of anymore than a purely technical film experience, it's not worth the time.

And one more thing: I, for one, appreciate the extreme care that went into Armageddon. The technical skill required to make it happen were far more impressive than most movies of this type. If the pace made it hard to follow, try paying more attention, because had it not been made as it was, it would have been even more boring. I wish, though, that it lived up to the superiority of The Rock.

Oh, and by honest, I'm largely comparing to the shallowness of Deep Impact. This one delivered everything it said it was going to, and didn't try to trick us into thinking it was any more.