Now
we get the Robinson family with William Hurt and Mimi Rogers playing the
parents John and Maureen Robinson, Heather Graham as Judy, Lacey Chabert
as Penny, Jack Johnson as Will, Matt LeBlanc as Don West, and Gary Oldman
as the dastardly Dr Smith. This new cast is ready to take the Robinson's
to the big screen in a big way.
The Robinsons are ready to save the earth.
Resources on earth are failing and there is an attempt by enemy forces
to take over the rest of earth's resources. So the Robinsons, well
actually John Robinson, has decided to take his family into space in an
attempt to save the earth. Do they want to go??? Well some
of them maybe....like Dr. Judy Robinson and maybe even Will but Penny definitely
doesn't want to go.
Don West is recruited to be the pilot of
the Jupiter 2 that is to go to Alpha Prime. Don is not one bit happy
that he has to go on this "baby-sitting" mission as he calls it and he
starts butting heads immediately with Dr. John Robinson and they each have 
their
own egos to look out for. He doesn't win much favor when he starts
to hit on the female Dr. on the flight either. What he doesn't realize
about her is that she is Dr. Judy Robinson, daughter of John. On
their way to Alpha Prime they have to prematurely engage the hyper drive
in an attempt to avoid the sun....the result.....they are "Lost in Space".
The Robinson's journey is filled with sabotage, double crossing, action, awesome sound, special effects, and a variety of creatures. Unfortunately despite all of those components of the journey, the movie itself just seemed to fall flat. I was worried about this film from the first preview I saw months ago with Matt LeBlanc. I just didn't buy him as Doug West in the preview. The pleasant surprise is that he was better than I expected, however not enough to help this film. Some of the few bright spots of the film took place in his dialogue with Heather Graham. They worked extremely well together and the sexual tension that existed, couple with the one-line barbs that were hurled back and forth, were both light and fun. Don't get me wrong, this film had its moments. When you but a great bad guy like Gary Oldman in a movie it can't help but be good once in awhile. Also the mountains of money spent on special effects and sound seem to be well spent. The sound in this picture is great. But overall I just left the screening with a feeling like I wasted my time, and that is not a good thing. It wasn't absolutely terrible, but it was close. "Danger" movie goer...."Danger"!!!
Grade: C-
Parents
Guide: The sexual dialogue between Judy Robinson and
Doug West may be offensive to some. While overall the dialog isn't
explicit by any means, it does contain some interesting innuendo.
The other instance of language that stood out like a sore thumb was Will's
utterance of "sh**". It seemed to be totally uncalled for and at
the absolute worst time in the movie when it stood out like a sore thumb.
It is a pet peeve of mine when films like this throw a single profanity
into a child or other characters mouth at a totally out of place time.
Other than that some of the scenes as the Robinson's fight off the creatures
they encounter are somewhat violent and scary for some youngsters.
Generally speaking if parents follow the PG-13 rating on this one they
should be ok. The better question is can they find a movie with better
content out there than this?