Review of Pandorum (2009) by John L — 27 Mar 2013

I didn't find the film "scary" per se, it was more a "suspense" with a good psychological element. Definitely fits in the sci-fi horror/thriller genre. Has enough jolts along the way to prevent boredom from lack of action. Had some inkling in general about what was going on by the end, but there were several surprising and significant twists revealed in the last few minutes.

The industrial cargo nature of the spacecraft is fitting for its mission instead of being a "luxury liner." I found some of the premises to be fairly decent and not too far-fetched. The potential psychological issues that could arise during extremely long missions are very real and this film uses that for the story. The one technical "problem" I observed is crew members and others who had awakened not realizing they were no longer in a zero-g environment . . . which would imply they had landed somewhere (would still be weightless in an orbit around a planet or star). Even if one assumes there is an artificially generated "gravity" for their journey they would certainly realize they were no longer in an artificial field. I can give that up for the sake of the story and this film is far from being the first to ignore weightlessness. Nearly every space sci-fi film except "2001" does that.

I don't expect films like this one to contain 100% scientific plausibility or technological correctness and will give up some of that in return for a good story. Overall I found it an enjoyable suspense thriller.