Woefully minuscule budget drags down the promise of this film. I DO understand why this movie is rated very low; among other things the sound quality is horrendous which in some spots makes it virtually impossible to follow the dialogue. Turn it up so you can hear one part of the conversation then the other participant blasts your eardrums--and the soundtrack for most of the movie is downright annoying.
There are some decent bits here--the dialogue isn't bad for the most part, and neither is most of the acting(I obviously disagree with some of the reviewers here). I think the acting is negatively affected by the sound issues and bad editing. As it is, I was particularly impressed with the leads and some of the characterizations were interesting. There are a few original bits here that you don't tend to see in films of this type--such as the acknowledgment of PTSD. bereavement, loss and the ongoing problems of sexual harassment (which unfortunately apparently all continue even far into the future). I would have liked to have seen an expanded view on their interactions and the effects on a population after a large portion has been wiped out and forced into hiding, but instead we get a focused and all-too familiar picture of Marines in the future working with the strangely anachronistic tech of 2016 (anachronistic for the far future anyway).
The story is familiar and straight forward. Sure there are the usual clichés, and the FXs were more like something you'd see in the 90s instead of 2007, but overall it's a bit of entertainment to while away an hour or two that didn't make me feel as if I wasted my time. This is (nominally) a science fiction film but it plays more like any war movie and even the settings, technology and relationships are far too fixed in today's time period--which detracts from the story line and shows a lack of imagination.
I imagine budget constraints prevented any real play with the tech but the script could have demonstrated at least SOME advancements in soldiering (at minimum treatments for the psychological issues--just a little research into cutting advancements could have served as inspiration) and how they deal with life and death challenges. They did this very well in "Aliens" as an example--tech played only a small part in updating the military force--the soldiers were familiar and yet their interactions and tactics were believably updated for that future). I'd love to see what the creators could do with a real budget.
