Review – 2010

What an unworthy sequel to a masterpiece of a movie. Sure, director Peter Hyams is no Stanley Kubrick, but he’s not solely responsible for the problems here. Instead, much of the blame falls on the dreadful script. I’m not sure how much of the problems started with the Arthur C. Clarke source novel, since I haven’t read it. But regardless of source of the problems, they’re bad. The HAL-loving computer geek character (well played by Bob Balaban) is so hateful I wanted to punch him, but I honestly got the feeling that he was supposed to be sympathetic. Maybe to the vast hordes of nerdy losers who frequent sci-fi conventions, but not to me. And HAL as a hero? Please. Oh please. It doesn’t help matters any that a fair amount of the drama depends on cold war tensions between the United States and the now-defunct Soviet Union, proving once again that mis-guessing the future is one sure way to help your sci fi movie look silly. Worst of all is that the mystery and awe of things cosmic and evolutionary in nature in the first one have somehow been transformed into a lot of borderline new age nonsense in the sequel. See if desperate