Deep Impact

Deep Impact confines much of its horror to television news reports and has a more brooding, thoughtful tone than this genre usually calls for.

Deep Impact, a triple-strand ensemble disaster flick, has a few good opening minutes, the biggest tidal wave you've ever seen in the closing minutes, and a cluster of little meandering melodramas in between.

The latest in Hollywood's almost biblical procession of disaster films, Deep Impact tries with moderate success to be more than just the sum of its special effects.

To its credit, the movie eschews cheap dramatics, but at times it eschews dramatics altogether.

If director Mimi Leder is really guilty of anything, it's of wasting three first-rate actors (Morgan Freeman, Vanessa Redgrave, and Robert Duvall) in underdeveloped roles while allowing Leoni's shell-shocked, unconvincing turn to become an embarrassment.

These folks are so blase, you'd think that scientists had predicted pennies from Heaven instead of world's end within the year.

Mimi Leder shows none of the vigor she exhibited when directing for E.R., and screenwriters Michael Tolkin and Bruce Joel Rubin betray a real aptitude for hack work.

An intelligent screenplay, talented cast, touching soundtrack, decent editing/pacing and excellent cinematography come together in fantastic cinematic fashion. Watch on the biggest screen with the biggest audio for the deepest impact. Some of the lines are a bit cheesy and many of the more ambitious visual effects don't hold up so well in 2022 but the heart of the story is here to see and enjoy all these years later.

This film tackles the end of the world in the traditional American perspective: a newly discovered comet threatens to destroy the planet and the US leads the crusade to eliminate the threat. Despite the obvious American imperialist propaganda implied here, the film is good, especially for those who enjoy catastrophe movies. His story bears a strong resemblance to "Armageddon" and some scenes remind us of "Independence Day", but there are big differences between these three films. One of the most notable is that this film gives more attention to the characters than to the tragic events. Unfortunately, this makes it a lot slower and monotonous than we might at first glance. There are people who see it as good, others want more action and they will get a little frustrated. I, in particular, have been able to appreciate this more leisurely way, although some scenes are perfectly expendable. The special effects have been quite well made and are grandiose, although they seem a little unbelievable. The characters have been very well developed, much better than most of the films of this genre, which helps a lot to catch the attention of the public. Elijah Wood and Leelee Sobieski can be particularly touching and, despite their young ages, get a good chemistry together. Even so, there are times when they exaggerated in sentimentality. The rest of the cast (where we can see experienced actors like Robert Duvall, Vanessa Redgrave or Morgan Freeman) has a much more contained and uninteresting record, which is a little surprising. Still, Freeman and Duvall have always been a little better than the rest of their peers, though their characters are relatively minor in the story (we may even think that the talent of the actors has been misused). Tea Leoni was clearly a casting mistake, she never really got her character.

This is better than your average impending-destruction-of-planet-Earth SF extravaganza. It adds more elements of mainstream drama to the story. The lead is an icy, ambitious young female newscaster (a character that is popping up more and more in real life as well as cinema). She (believably portrayed by Tea Leoni) struggles with family problems and stumbles across what looks like a political scandal, but turns out to be something much bigger. Freeman is a dignified presence as the president. The tale of the brilliant teen and his girlfriend is cute but predictable. There are some cool apocalyptic effects towards the end - action fans will probably want to just skip ahead to those.

C'est la cata ! Deep Impact est un condensé de tout ce qu'il ne faut pas faire dans un film-catastrophe comme par exemple, endormir son audience (par exemple !). Ou bien ne pas étirer la guimauve plus que le nécessaire ou le strict nécessaire syndical très strict parce que sinon... non seulement ça nous fait chier mais en plus ça devient complètement ridicule. Alors bien sûr, Freeman a déjà endossé le rôle-type de toute sa carrière en plein essor à venir, c'est-à-dire le vieux sage à l'air grave et digne qui fait passer Maître Yoda pour un pilier de bar qui vient de tomber dans le coma -le temps qu'on ré-inverse les syllabes, on dort déjà- car après un discours du vieux bonze noir, l'acceptation de la catastrophe se fait dans la plus sereine des résignations. Et dans le vaisseau pour nous sauver, un autre bonze qui a trop la "cool attitude", ce vieux briscard de Duvall, un autre philosophe de la vie... euh du sacrifice et de l'héroïsme, la main sur le coeur et le sourire aux lèvres comme l'entraîneur qui fait son dernier discours avant l'envoi de la rencontre. La Téa Leoni est mimi en fouille-merde fouineuse mais tout de même un peu limitée, un peu comme cette musique "digne" qui n'en finit pas de déborder de dignité et de sacrifice d'un bout à l'autre du film, film qui se traîne ignominieusement et lamentablement, sauf à la fin, la toute fin... et encore ! Différent d'Armageddon et au moins sans Bruce Willis (ouf !) et malgré sa réalisation appliquée, Deep machin n'a décidément aucun impact sur le spectateur et le reste du monde. Un courant d'air tout au plus.

Watched movie again after 15 years. Bad movie. Poor acting and very predictable and ridiculous script. Now I know why I haven't seen Téa Leoni in many movies of note. She did a poor job of acting in this movie.