Riddles of the Sphinx

No surprise - about what you would expect from a third rate network. The budget was probably whatever the limit on the producer's credit card was. All of the typical clichés for a poorly written / directed / acted project that looks like it was done by a bunch of film students over a weekend in Vancouver. (Yeah, we noticed that Egypt, Greece, and Iraq all look a lot like British Columbia in the fall, cough, cough)

The only real surprise is that someone with the talent of Dina Meyer would agree to participate in this kind of garbage. Yeah she looked great, but come on, put any physically fit 40 year old actress in an outfit inspired by Laura Croft and they will too. Need the work that badly eh - what a shame.

A big waste of time and pretty sad considering how many other potentially decent projects didn't get bankrolled so this waste of film could.

The Sci-Fi channel. Despite having some really good original TV series, I always think of the network first and foremost as the "Disaster/Monster B-movie network". Even its documentaries are blatantly science fiction. That may come as a shock to some people, but dude, you CAN'T find a crystal skull with a metal detector...

I only watched this movie because I was bored and I have a more than passing fascination with archaeology. I don't normally watch Sci-Fi Saturday.

Now, as a writer, I understand that ideas are a dime a dozen, but I also know that we've been out of ideas pretty much since we've had the ability to HAVE ideas. That said, I understand the similarities to The Librarian and Indiana Jones, but COME ON! Don't make the hero of this movie dress IDENTICALLY like Jones! That's just taking the similarity too far!

I applaud the idea of a female hero, but don't make her so gung-ho about guns that she admits they're her "security blanket" and continues using them after realizing time and time again the hard way that the monster's completely bulletproof.

I can also understand the need to draw in the young adult demographic, but having the tweenaged girl be a complete genius and outthink the adults in almost every scene smacks of badly written Mary Sue fanfiction, especially if the concerned father seriously makes such a stupid decision as to take the kid into the heart of the war in Iraq(wearing bright pink no less), let alone repeatedly exposing the kid to an invulnerable monster when there's a perfectly good hidden sanctuary where she'd be safe. There's a reason why we have satphones, people.

As for the writing, the movie was so completely predictable, it's hard to come up with a suitable adjective to describe it.

Riddles of the Sphinx (2008) which I saw on the UK Sci-Fi Channel Today out of boredom more than anything, is clearly a homage (Rip-off) of Indiana Jones, Right down to the Main Character's job as a College Professor and his choice of clothes complete with Indiana Jones style Hat..

The biggest problems with this is the dire acting and totally unconvincing performance by the lead actor

The budget is VERY low as most of the 'action' in filmed in front of not-very anonymous Backscreen...as The Filming ALL took place in Canada and There are only 4 characters in the entire Film...So the 'Double Agent' is obvious from the get go...

I'm a big fan of these types of Adventures, but this badly needed more money spent...and as a result my rating is low.

*1/2 out of *****

The delectable Dina Meyer and the normally competent Lochlyn Munro co-star in this turkey made for The Sci-Fi Channel, about archaeologists unleashing an unkillable monster from an Egyptian tomb. Meyer looks great in black leather and shooting two guns at a time a la Tomb Raider Lara Croft while Munro simply looks like an idiot in an Indiana Jones hat about two sizes too big for his head. The movie goes nowhere once the monster is unleashed, which happens about five minutes in. At times, the creature looks like a poor man's griffin; at other times, it morphs into a bad copy of Inhotep from the first two THE MUMMY movies. The dialog is from hunger, as is the acting. Other than tuning in to get a look at the beautiful Meyer, this one is best skipped.

I couldn't take this movie seriously from very early on in the movie. The CGI department, or whomever was giving them instructions, obviously didn't know what a sphinx looks like and decided to go with a strange looking griffin instead. Even I could tell the difference between the two creatures while I was still in grade school.

The acting was fairly poor. The make-up department should never be hired by anyone ever again. The bald guy looks like his head was shaved the day they stared filming and make-up never even tried to blend the skin tone.

The script was pathetic. I've seen some bad stuff on SciFi and this is one of the worst. The male lead just comes off as corny while the female lead is normally a much better actress. The little girl suffers from the Wesley Crusher syndrome. People don't like this so why do they keep using it as a plot device I will never understand.