Today’s quick review: Armageddon. When NASA discovers an asteroid the size of Texas about to collide with the Earth, NASA official Dan Truman (Billy Bob Thornton) calls on Harry Stamper (Bruce Willis), an expert oil driller, to help with a last-ditch scheme to save the planet. He and his crew (Owen Wilson, Michael Clarke Duncan, and Steve Buscemi) must travel to the asteroid and drill a hole deep enough for a nuclear warhead to split the rock in half. But NASA has their work cut out for them whipping the clownish drillers into shape, and Stamper must come to grips with the fact that his protege A.J. (Ben Affleck) is in love with his daughter Grace (Liv Tyler).
Armageddon is a fast-paced disaster thriller from director Michael Bay. For a genre that should be back-loaded, Armageddon manages to pack in an astonishing amount of action. Explosions are frequent, and even the parts of the film without an immediate catastrophe are filled with humor, emotional drama, or plot development to keep things moving.
Armageddon is a movie that wears its heart on its sleeve. Everything is big, from the meteor shower that devastates New York to the spending spree Stamper’s men go on before heading into space. Armageddon runs the full gamut of emotion, from blue collar fun and over-the-top action scenes to grim determination and tragic farewells. It is an emotional thrill ride with clear conflicts, clean execution, and big payoffs.
The cast is every bit as lively as the rest of the film. The main trio of Bruce Willis, Ben Affleck, and Liv Tyler form the emotional core of the film, while Owen Wilson, Michael Clarke Duncan, Steve Buscemi, and the rest of Stamper’s crew provide comic relief. The characters are drawn in simple, satisfying strokes that give their talented actors plenty to work with.
Skip Armageddon if you are looking for a sophisticated movie, a subversion, or anything but a fun time. It embraces its genre and plays it to the hilt, and the only winking at the camera is done through the film’s good-natured comedy. It is packed to the gills with cheap tricks to keep the audience interested, from the crew’s comic antics to transparent emotional subplots to dramatic camera work. None of this will appeal to the cerebral viewer.
But it will appeal to the emotional viewer. Watch Armageddon if you enjoy action films and are in the mood for one with skillful execution and unusual amounts of heart. Armageddon takes a decent premise, a great cast, and explosions aplenty and weaves them into a film that is entertaining at every level.
6.6 out of 10 on IMDB. I give it a 7.5 to 8.0 for entertainment, emotional richness, and overall quality.