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sinanjuThat's the problem with NBC's remake of the film. It doesn't know what it wants to be. The Poseidon Adventure is one of those films I'll always stop to watch when I stumble across it on cable. Yeah, it's full of 70's disaster-flick cheese, but it was still an interesting film and--to give its makers credit--they knew what they intended it to be. It was 70s cheese--but it was sincerely committed cheese.
The modern remake begins with the ubiquitous terrorist cell plotting their evil plots. Their machinations are (mostly) foiled by black-clad anti-terrorist soldiers, but not before evidence of the identity of one target--the Poseidon--is destroyed. Only then do we see the passengers arriving on the Poseidon, including Jayne from "Firefly" as Mike Rogo, undercover agent of Homeland Security posing as passenger.
Despite the best efforts of Jayne, the ship's Captain and various others, they fail to stop all the terrorists. They blow a hole in the side of the ship and thru some miracle of hydrodynamics that I don't follow (because frankly I don't think it holds water--no pun intended), the ship turns turtle. No giant tidal wave this time--only the machinations of evil men.
At this point the movie begins to resemble the original. The dramatic scenes of people sliding and falling as the ship rolls over. The guy falling into the stained-glass skylight. The arguments over whether to stay or go, using the fallen Christmas tree to climb up. The ballroom flooding eventually. The whole schmeer.
...all of which is intercut with the Dulcet Cruise Lines command center losing contact with the ship, eventually notifying the maritime authorities, and ultimately the Navy. The Navy is On The Job. This is where the dramatic differences in technology available between the original film and now come into play. GPS tracking, satellite communication, surveillance satellites for searching for the missing ship, AWACs planes ditto. Some of the survivors use a terminal in the ship's internet lounge to send an email asking for help. (I'm skeptical of this. The ship's antennas are all on the top of the ship, meaning that they'd be underwater now, even assuming the computers are still working.)
The Navy is busy dramatically organizing search and rescue operations. It's all very...dramatic. And dark. This is all occurring at night, and very little of it is easy to see.
Meanwhile, the people on the Poseidon are doing their "rats in a maze" imitation, trying to reach salvation. Alas, it isn't done nearly as well as in the older film. Largely, I suspect, because so much attention is paid to the nifty-keen, high-tech rescue operation scenes. The older film's sets, despite the absolute lack of CGI and other cool SFX technologies, were far more convincing as the interior of an upside down ship.
I'll have watched the whole thing before the night is over, but I'll never bother with it again. Next time I watch The Poseidon Adventure, I'll stick with Ernest Borgnine, Shelley Winters, Pamela Sue Martin and company.
The modern remake begins with the ubiquitous terrorist cell plotting their evil plots. Their machinations are (mostly) foiled by black-clad anti-terrorist soldiers, but not before evidence of the identity of one target--the Poseidon--is destroyed. Only then do we see the passengers arriving on the Poseidon, including Jayne from "Firefly" as Mike Rogo, undercover agent of Homeland Security posing as passenger.
Despite the best efforts of Jayne, the ship's Captain and various others, they fail to stop all the terrorists. They blow a hole in the side of the ship and thru some miracle of hydrodynamics that I don't follow (because frankly I don't think it holds water--no pun intended), the ship turns turtle. No giant tidal wave this time--only the machinations of evil men.
At this point the movie begins to resemble the original. The dramatic scenes of people sliding and falling as the ship rolls over. The guy falling into the stained-glass skylight. The arguments over whether to stay or go, using the fallen Christmas tree to climb up. The ballroom flooding eventually. The whole schmeer.
...all of which is intercut with the Dulcet Cruise Lines command center losing contact with the ship, eventually notifying the maritime authorities, and ultimately the Navy. The Navy is On The Job. This is where the dramatic differences in technology available between the original film and now come into play. GPS tracking, satellite communication, surveillance satellites for searching for the missing ship, AWACs planes ditto. Some of the survivors use a terminal in the ship's internet lounge to send an email asking for help. (I'm skeptical of this. The ship's antennas are all on the top of the ship, meaning that they'd be underwater now, even assuming the computers are still working.)
The Navy is busy dramatically organizing search and rescue operations. It's all very...dramatic. And dark. This is all occurring at night, and very little of it is easy to see.
Meanwhile, the people on the Poseidon are doing their "rats in a maze" imitation, trying to reach salvation. Alas, it isn't done nearly as well as in the older film. Largely, I suspect, because so much attention is paid to the nifty-keen, high-tech rescue operation scenes. The older film's sets, despite the absolute lack of CGI and other cool SFX technologies, were far more convincing as the interior of an upside down ship.
I'll have watched the whole thing before the night is over, but I'll never bother with it again. Next time I watch The Poseidon Adventure, I'll stick with Ernest Borgnine, Shelley Winters, Pamela Sue Martin and company.
