Armageddon

Review.

I did watch The X-Files - Fight The Future a the second time. (The first time back in 1999.) It was disappointing then, and it was still disappointing, 20 years later.

I had better memories of Armageddon and decided to give that one another try as well. The same 20 years later and less disappointing 😊


Armageddon.

Now, Armageddon was exactly what I remembered. Things must go boom, rather loudly, I wanna' see lots of bullets, and hero's that laugh in the face of danger. Or make me laugh seeing their faces in danger. Or... ehm... something along those lines.

What makes a movie a good one? A good plot (not in this one). Good characters (rather cardboard figures in this one). Cool graphical effects (loads of 'm, was this by the makers of Independence Day?) and low rumbling stomach shaking sounds (including a soundtrack that borrowed a bit from Godzilla, unless it's the other way around).

Bruce Willis was still in good shape. Not a terrible good actor, but fun to tag along with. (I saw some recent movies including him, and most of them were disappointing affairs. Sorry.)

Armageddon is still a fun movie to watch. It has aged a bit, and works better on some grainy screen / smaller tablet (as you would otherwise notice that the CGI effects are not up to snuff compared with modern stuff) so don't get an UHD Blu-ray for this one, a heavily compressed, downloaded copy works better.

You might consider turning the quality in Netflix a little bit down 😁 though you might want to keep the soundtrack in all it's pounding glory. (CGI may be dated, but the soundtrack is still great.)


Required ingredients

What else does a good movie need? It must feature Scifi / fantasy, action, humor (loads of (bad) jokes, one-liners, uncomfortable situations). If possible I'd like a save-the-world theme (check) and a couple of good looking chicks (not too many in this movie, but still).

Yes. I suffer from cheap taste.


Verdict

Armageddon features enough of the above in gratifying doses. And it worked fine for me, it did so in 1999, and still does today: a roller coaster ride with a good laugh. It's perhaps not per-se good SF, but it's certainly enjoyable. Better value for money than the X-files movie. And certainly more fun than the similarly inspired Deep Impact.


Slower

One note though... Movies have become faster and faster. Slow explanations, quite common in older movies, are no part of modern daily fare. The 1986 movie Short Circuit is a good example. It was okay back in 1986, but nowadays it feels like a drag. Armageddon hasn't reached that stage yet, but the different / slower 'speed' is noticeable after all these years.


(Dapper / TellTales! 24i)