Director Jack Plotnick's 'Space Station 76'
is truly a joy to behold. Visually at least. A
space opera that has the look and feel right out of the late
sixties or early seventies, it manages to magically transport
us back in time where the thought of what the future looked
like was very different. Since I'm no special effects
expert or anything, I don't know if the external space shots
were done in CGI or actual miniatures… we're going to guess
CGI since miniature creation is expensive and a lost art… but
they sure did make it look like those objects in outerspace
were miniatures. Then we have the clothes the cast were
wearing, the interior design of the space station, the style
in which everything looked to be overlit and hyper clean… an
amazing visual experience this 'Space Station 76'. But…
alas… to what end? That would be the overriding question
to the very beautiful 'Space Station 76'.
Say hello to the lovely pilot Jessica, as played by the lovely
Liv Tyler who has just boarded Space Station 76 to be the new
co-pilot. What purpose this space station serves, or
what exactly is happening in this futuristic society is never
explained to us, so do not bother asking. This station
is being captained by the completely miserable Capt. Glenn
(Patrick Wilson) who spends most of his time drunk, attempting
suicide and missing his former co-pilot David.
Also of note on this station is Ted the maintenance guy (Matt
Bomer) who is married to the completely abhorrent Misty
(Marissa Coughlin) with these two being the parents of the
completely adorable seven year old, Sunshine (Kylie
Rogers). There are other people on the station but we're
not going to worry about them. Actually I wasn't all
that concerned about the people we've just described, but we
will move on.
There's also a meteor which has had its normal orbit
redirected and seems to be on a collision course with the
Space Station.
So we follow the lives of the poor, sad souls
on the ship, Jessica who is miserable about being barren, Ted
being miserable about almost every facet of his existence…
until he met Jessica… Captain Glenn being miserable about
being gay, and Misty being miserable about having to be
married Ted. Little Sunshine is kind of miserable too,
but she's a seven year old girl.
And that meteor is still coming. We don't want the
meteor to hit the space station because, quite honestly, it's
just too beautiful to wreck. But if somehow it could
just kill everybody inside the
space station… that wouldn't be a problem for us.
What is this movie, 'Space Station 76'? That is the
question we are sitting here asking ourselves. As we
mentioned earlier, it is truly something to witness visually,
with images that spark memories of A Space Odyssey, THX or
even one of the old episodes of the original Star Trek
Series. But to echo the thoughts of a friend of mine who
also saw this film, I just didn't get it.
Then, of course, maybe there was nothing to get. As the
film starts out, considering the setup and the look, one would
be of the mind that we are getting a spoof of sorts of some
those old 70's space films, but no, this isn't that kind of
movie. Similar to 'Black Dynamite', which is also often
mistaken for a spoof, this is an homage. This is a movie
that faithfully and lovingly recreates a period piece, and
then places an actual movie within that. 'Black
Dynamite' was funny, no doubt, but the majority of the humor
just naturally came out of the silliness of the story which
was typical for that time. 'Space Station 76' on the
other hand left me curious about what kind of story it was
trying to tell or what kind of movie it trying to be.
There was the sci-fi backdrop, and there was certainly some
humor, mostly provided by the awesome Dr. Bot, but it
certainly wasn't a film we could call a pure comedy. It
was mostly a relationship drama, and a miserable relationship
drama at that since pretty much all of characters have found
themselves existing in some form of pre-middle aged
crisis. Thus your enjoyment of 'Space Station 76', once
you get past the pretty visuals, will be how much you care
about these characters and their problems. Me? I
didn't care about them too terribly much.
In fact, if you take away the faithfully recreated sci-fi
setting, and simply stuck these guys in an apartment building
in downtown Los Angeles in 2014, or 1986, you would get the
same movie. Meaning to say the sci-fi backdrop, as nice
as it is, isn't too terribly relevant to what's going on in
these characters lives. Of course I probably wouldn't
have watched that movie that took place in a Los Angeles
apartment building in 1986, but there it is.
I would have to say that the whole of 'Space Station 76' is an
acquired taste. Because the movie just looks and feels
so 'cool', and the film does possess a very talented and
attractive cast, I wouldn't be able to offer much in the way
of a counter for anyone who enjoyed this movie, story and
all. I'm just not in that camp, but it was still
something to see.
