Review of The Core (2003) by Kim K — 12 Jul 2012

The Core (Jon Amiel, 2003).

If there is one thing that Hollywood does very well, it's the big, stupid, action-laden fantasy-adventure flick ("fantasy" in the sense that "this could seriously never happen" rather than "dragons and swords"). Of course, I need to qualify that. When I say they do this kind of movie well, I mean they have the maximum number of explosions per minute audiences will take down to a science, and they know just who to cast for whichever stereotypes the movie needs, and they know that with a few seemingly-brave casting decisions, they'll catch a few critics off-guard and get some nice things said about the movie, enough to get it a decent opening week (after which receipts invariably plummet as the guys who wrote the more scathing reviews start getting quoted by people who finally got to see the film).It doesn't matter if the movie makes back its box office on the big screen, since video rentals will almost certainly top the budget. Besides, TBS and TNT have to do something when they're not showing Monk reruns, right?

If I sound a touch cynical about this, well, that's because I am. I am also, on a fairly regular basis, shocked by the sheer number of amazing actors who can get sucked into what is, essentially, a Schwarzenegger flick with some sort of pseudoscience layered over it to give it the semblance of intelligence (in fact, IMDB notes that the Earth and Ocean Science 310 course uses the film as a textbook in junk science). This is one of those times. Delroy Lindo? Hilary Swank? Tcheky Karyo? Alfre Woodard, for heaven's sake? Did you really need the money badley enough that you didn't flee screaming for the hills as soon as Deborah Aquila mentioned that Christopher Young (Urban Legendi, Swordfish, Species) was doing the soundtrack?

Plot: the earth has stopped spinning, and is in danger of going kaplooie unless the United States government ('cause no one else can do it!) can send a probe to the center of the earth to restart the core. So they start gathering folks who manage to be both expendable and good at what they do, either because they're fringe elements (Lindo as Ed Brazzleton, discoverer of "Unobtainium", which is a sci-fi in-joke; it's a derisive term used for "and then a miracle happens" in the sci-fi world), or because they messed up their last assignment (Swank, as Rebecca Childs, the pilot of the probe), or because their views aren't popular with the ruling class (Aaron Eckhart as Josh Keyes, the head of the team). I point this out as a nod to the film's subtlety and mastery of character, of course. Needless to say, they are racing against time, the odds against the project succeeding are about one in a million, and of course, everyone has to have deep, meaningful moments with other members of the team just before they croak.

No, there's nothing here you haven't seen a hundred times before, in movies that were either marginally better because they didn't take themselves so seriously (VolcanoThe Abyss). But then, hey, Armageddon cleared, what, six hundred million and scored a Criterion release? (That is still one of the most improbable decisions in film history.) Why not pump out another barrage of big-budget action crap to see if wee can duplicate it? The Core did not. On the big screen, it made back a little over half its budget (not surprisingly, id made well over a third of its total big-screen receipts on opening weekend). But video rentals and TV showings made it a profit, and that's all that matters in Hollywood when you're on the level where you can actually budget sixty million dollars for a brainless action film. And as long as you're looking for a movie where stuff blows up a lot and you don't have to expend any brain power at all in service of the plot, you can do a lot worse than The Core. **.