Badmovies.org Forum

Many consider this movie a classic science fiction. I've always kind of liked the movie; until I sat down and watched it for the first time in 10 years. I have to tell you, I like it a lot less this time around. I mean, I have no sympathy for the Bruce Dern character. Right from the get go, he seems extremely disturbed and ready to snap at any moment. He has this crazed, fanatical, look in his eye for most of the movie. In fact, it doesn't take much to provoke him to commit murder (or- "self defense"). He shows little or no remorse. And then in the very end, he's about to be rescued- he commits suicide! Pretty uplifting! So, there's this dome floating around space with a bunch of ferns and shrubbery. What happens when the power runs out? What happens when the drone malfunctions? Furthermore, why destroy the domes in the first place? All the time and money cultivating the trees and wildlife and then all of a sudden- arbitrarily blowing it up?! Even from the get go, the Bruce Dern came across as real nut case. In fact, I feel sorry for his crew members having to put up with him. After all, they were only doing there job when they were given orders to blow everything up.

That is the question that has always bugged me about this movie. Why blow up the domes? It makes no sense when it's cheaper, safer and easier to just abandon them. For that matter, it seemed like they could go right on functioning indefinitely without a human presence or a ship attached to them, considering that was how the movie ended. The whole plot depended on decisions that made absolutely no sense, except that they gave the hero a motive.

They had to blow up the domes because bludgeoning the audience over the head with environmentalism was the whole point of the movie.  The non-environmentalists couldn't be sufficiently demonized unless they nuked the pretty little flowers and the bunnies.

I too liked this back when I was a kid, but when I tried watching it again a year ago, I couldn't make it past the first half hour.  Cool special effects though.