Asteroid vs Earth

If you're a seasoned movie goer but have become tired of the relentless big box office releases then this is the movie for you.

You'll need to nail your feet to the floor and duct tape your eyes open for the full 90 minute duration if you're to reap the benefit offered by this pox riddled flick.

I'm unable to divulge any further details, as if you've not seen this movie then you'll think I made the whole thing up.

On the upside, you'll come out the other side with a new appreciation of those big box office movies.

I watched this anticipating, even looking forward to, a bad movie. Within a few minutes, it sets up the premise as revealed in the title. As such, it starts like any of too many movies with same basic plot, and devolves from there. Incomprehensible, unrelated, unexplainable events follow, and then the movie ends. That is as much as you need to know going into it, and it's more than you will remember one day later. I feel sorry for Tia Carrere for being desperate enough to be in this movie. It is typical fare for Jason Brooks.

It aspires to the level of even a typical Syfy Original movie from Asylum, but fails. It's no Sharknado.

An asteroid is discovered to be on a collision course with Earth. This one is 200 miles wide; comparatively, the one thought to have wiped out the dinosaurs was only six miles wide. Ouch. For some nonsensical reasons, it is decided to move Earth out of the way. Earthquakes are set to "blow up the Yap Trench" and save the planet. Taking the planet Earth out of its orbit and rotation would also kill everyone, but nobody seems to care. US military officials abduct undersea deep sea geophysicist Tia Carrere (as Marissa Knox) and nuclear submarine pilot Jason Brooks (as Chase Seward) to assist in moving Earth. They were just about to have sex, but Earth comes first...

Science fiction at its worst. Christopher Douglas Olen Ray unsteadily directs this woefully haphazard disaster movie. The plot makes no scientific sense; grade-school knowledge about Earth and the solar system are, apparently, forgotten by college students. While writer Adam Lipsius scores points with diverse characters, they have little chemistry and no community. Several take the assignment too seriously. This may be why less seasoned performers like Charles Byun (as Evan "Telly" Kitsias) outperform elders like Robert Davi (as Jim Masterson). The most memorable co-stars, Wade F. Wilson and Craig Blair (as Rudy and Terry), never appear on screen together.

** Asteroid vs Earth (4/29/14) Christopher Ray ~ Jason Brooks, Tia Carrere, Robert Davi, Wade F. Wilson

Given the synopsis of this movie, you know that you are going to be in for a low budget version of disaster movies already done before with bigger budgets and a more impressive cast list.

And the very first thing that pops up on the screen is in itself a warning sign enough to behold, The Asylum. Yep, a movie such as this is, of course, a movie by The Asylum. So why keep watching it? Well, every now and then The Asylum do manage to strike gold and release something that is impressive and surprisingly good. "Asteroid vs. Earth" wasn't one of those moments, however.

A massive asteroid is on a collision course with Earth, and it is up to the American military to save the world, of course. And how do they plan to do this? Well, first of all by attempting to scatter the meteor into fragments by blowing it up with nuclear warheads out in space (yep, that has been seen and done before countless times). And if that plan is to fail, the failsafe plan is to detonate nuclear warheads in a deep oceanic trench to, and I kid you not, move the entire Earth out of the trajectory of the meteor. Move the Earth, are you kidding me? I guess that puts a whole new meaning to the song "I feel the Earth move".

The storyline in "Asteroid vs. Earth" is just so preposterous and out there that it doesn't pass as being believable for even the slightest of moments. And you just sit there throughout the entire movie baffled at the ludicrous imagination going on here.

I sat down to watch this movie simply because of Tia Carrere, and she actually do manage to make the movie watchable. The rest of the movie barely scrapes by as being mildly entertaining at best.

The effects in the movie is nothing to make notice of. It wasn't particularly memorable. But truth be told, I have seen much worse effects and CGI in movies.

If you enjoy disaster movies, there are far better ones available.

Anything from The Asylum does make one wary, as does a movie of theirs with a vs. title and a concept as silly as the one in Asteroid vs. Earth. The Asylum have definitely done far worse and there are a couple of redeeming merits. The best thing about Asteroid vs. Earth is Tia Carrere who gives a very charming performance and has a compelling enough screen presence. The scenery is nice too and there are moments of halfway decent photography, the editing also could have been far worse as well. The look of the movie though is far too drab giving it a gloomy and overly-serious visual quality, and while there have been far worse special effects in an Asylum movie they look rushed and awkward as there been inconsistency in how they're proportioned. The music is much too pedestrian and is constantly happening, when the orchestration and sound is so heavy throughout and in a dramatic sense it does get too much really. Apart from Carrere the acting is not much to write home about, Robert Davi spends the whole time looking lost and Paul Russ plays his role far too seriously. There are no characters here to engage with, not in the annoying sense but in that they are very cardboard and underwritten, and the script at best is flimsy with dialogue that is flat and at times gibberish-like and things that are picked up on but rarely explored. The story, the concept of which was silly to begin with, is ludicrously implausible to the point in places of being incoherent, any potential fun is so hampered by stupidity that it's tiring instead and the unconvincing conflicts and predictability makes Asteroid vs. Earth very low on the tension and suspense levels. Overall, there is far worse than Asteroid vs. Earth from The Asylum, but it is still pretty bad with every ingredient for a badly done disaster movie(mostly from The Asylum oddly enough) present here. 3/10 Bethany Cox