Origin Unknown

'2036 Origin Unknown' actually sounded pretty interesting. The low rating and lukewarm at best reviews here and much of the internet made me not sure as to whether it would be good, but there were some great ideas here and the concept sounded like the film would be good intriguing stuff if done right.

After seeing it, '2036 Unknown Origin' to me was not a terrible film, it has its moments. When it comes to recent low budget recent viewings it is nowhere near close to being one of the worst. A large part of me though was rather disappointed, another example of a film with great ideas and concept and just as great potential but none of them properly lived up to, not completely wasted but this should have been much more. The not so enthusiastic critical reception is understandable though while sharing a lot of the criticisms directed against it didn't find it that bad.

From personal opinion, it did have some atmosphere in the sets, an effective visual claustrophobia and the photography was quite nice, for low budget this could have fared much worse. It does start off well, it is intriguing, sets things up nicely and is not too badly paced.

The acting was also better than average, with a more than credible lead performance from Katee Sackhoff who had the hard task of carrying much of the film with not much support. Her character was one that didn't annoy or bore me and there was effort made to develop her. Julie Cox and Steven Cree, added in apparently during post-production, are also fine.

However, '2036 Origin Unknown's' main problem is the story. It does feel dragged out, like a short film stretched to feature, and gets over-complicated as a result of having too many ideas/areas and not enough of them being fully explored, meaning that there is a lack of clarity. This is not a case of not trying, more a case of trying too hard. The ending is just weird and impossible to make sense of, also not feeling much of an ending. The sound is also off, being too loud and constant and tending to be favoured over the dialogue.

Ray Fearon is pretty forgettable here and his character is just moving story forward plot device material. The direction is not incompetent but uninspired and shows a lack of experience. The over-reliance-on-exposition script doesn't flow very well and just feels half-baked and wordy in a way not always easy to understand. The special effects are very ropy, they don't blend well and the proportions can be inconsistent.

Overall, had great potential and Sackhoff especially makes it watchable but suffers from dullness and being over-complicated and half-baked. 4/10 Bethany Cox

It's 2030. Mars 1 crashes on the planet after getting hit by an energy field. Six years later, Mack Wilson (Katee Sackhoff) leads the investigation into the crash chaffing under the artificial intelligence computer ARTI's control. They find an object of unknown origin.

This is reminiscent of an old style sci-fi magazine story. British filmmaker Hasraf Dulull started in CGI and videogames into trying to make these smaller budget sci-fi movies. This could have been a Twilight zone episode although it may still be not good. It's stuffed with CGI scenes of a Mars mission. The human scenes consist mostly Sackhoff, a computer voice, and a techie room. The movie lacks a human touch and a human story. In short, it lacks humanity no matter how hard Sackhoff tries. It's only good for a shorter sci-fi TV episode.

So Starbuck goes into the mission control room and starts to engage with Hal who is operating the Mars lander. A minute passes. Then another minute and before long another minute has passed. Hal and Starbuck converse and try to solve the issues as another minute passes. 94 minutes later. ..roll credits

This wasn't very good.

Movies about AI always want to be thought-provoking, and at the same time they always reinvent the same wheels over and over. This movie is no different.

If this had been made in the 80's, it would probably be considered a much better movie. But this is 2018 and you really have to bring something better to the table, especially if you want to preach a certain message.

I'm guessing there was a clear lack of budget, because apart from the CGI quality that ranges from barely passable to outright terrible, they had to invent some "science" and background to the story to justify the lack of actors and sets; the movie takes place in one room, and it's 90% Katee Sackhoff you see on screen.

This is not necessarily a bad thing, because with a great script and a great actor you can really create something wonderful (and CGI be damned). But the script overall is just so poor and Katee Sackhoff, who manages to pull off a decent performance (but no more than that), simply can't carry something like this and just drowns in the bad dialogue and overall story that unfolds around her in a largely illogical and mostly very unoriginal manner.

The pacing overall is slow, but not too slow for me personally, and nearing the end it does try to offer some sort of resolvement, with a little twist. If the movie itself had been better up to that point, I probably could have appreciated that effort a bit more. It also didn't help that most of the bigger questions are actually never answered and that the last 15 or so minutes were apparently filmed through a kaleidoscope.

All in all, not an unlikeable movie, but it's just not good at all. 4,5/10, rounding it up to a generous 5.

What writer and director in 2017 would think it's a grand idea to resurrect the worst of so-called "science fiction" from the Seventies and Eighties, including the mind-numbing kaleidoscopic effects that were stand-ins for actual special effects?

There is no science on display here, though it is certainly fictional. Fiction without science is just fantasy. Exploitation of a few trendy buzzwords and concepts from STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) does not make it scientific. There is neither any deep thinking. The plot and concepts are incoherent, like the hallucinogenic "trip" of a career drug addict. The writer apparently had an extended trip himself and began to imagine himself as a philosophical genius who had wisdom to impart to the rest of us?

He isn't and he didn't.