News Flash! Sunshine Sucks!
Well, this isn’t surprising at all.
Surprise, surprise the upcoming movie Sunshine, the movie that tries to fix the part of the sun that is dying, isn’t any good.
It’s harder to forgive the lapses of logic and plausibility that I imagine arise from the filmmakers’ unfamiliarity with basic astronomy and physics and astronautics — what I suspect most SF readers would know, even without Brian Cox. Here’s a list:
Click on the above link to read the list in it’s entirety. Here’s my favorite:
You realize gradually that the producers (or perhaps the screenwriter in particular, but given the collaborative nature of film work, I’ll generalize) don’t appreciate the dynamic nature of how spaceships and astronomical bodies necessarily move with respect to each other. (The word ‘orbit’ is mentioned with alarm at one point; I don’t recall hearing the word ‘trajectory’ at all.) Early on in the film, the Icarus II spots the earlier ship, the first Icarus, at a location just a few degrees from the current mission’s target… as if the ship is just sitting there in space, suspended over a spot above the sun’s surface. (How?) Later, we come to understand that the current mission will have the Icarus II pull up at its target spot, release its payload, and then just sorta move back out of range before the payload explodes… as if it’s not deep deep in an enormous gravity well.
I’m dreading the release of this movie, it’s got the most ludicrous premise I’ve ever heard.
Thanks to Shannon for the heads up!
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3 opinions for News Flash! Sunshine Sucks!
Shannon
Jul 6, 2007 at 10:21 am
The part you quoted here, made me laugh out loud when I read it. Who in their right mind doesn’t factor in the gravitational pull of the sun? There’s also a part where the review mentions the press release, which goes to great pains to point out that they spoke to a someone about the plausability of the sun dying, and they thought they had at least a thin working theory. Some purely theortical thing, but at least something to go off of. And then, what happens? They don’t even bring that theory into the movie. God that’s annoying. Why waste time trying to find out if it’s plausable if you are going to insult the viewer’s intelligence by not even giving them that theory. They just expect the movie going audience to take the whole premise in stride, or to just not know any better, and not really care. This is a huge reason why summer movies stink. Beause Hollywood seriously underestimates our abality to be reasonable and logical, and our need for cohesive plots. Oh well, it will probably make millions of dollars anyway, and that’s all they really care about. Again, too much coffee today. I really must stop ranting.
Billy
Sep 17, 2007 at 1:49 pm
How can you say this movie was not realistic?!? Put together an incompitent crew to save humanity from an implusable threat with an even more impluasable solution not based on any known science… and if it doesnt work the first time, ignore all the obvious faults,don’t change anything, and just keep trying until it does. Sounds like the kind of mission the government would come up with (and has before) This movie nailed it right on. =) That’s as realistic as it gets!!! If everything made sense and it went smoothly… now thats sci-fi.
Sprawn!
Jan 31, 2008 at 1:24 am
They could have asked a ninth grader taking Physics I for advice and done a better job. A little advice, do not try to write a Science Fiction film if you think the Roadrunner Cartoons are documentaries.
It is established in the film that they are flying DIRECTLY at the sun at 29,000 kilometers per hour. When they get really, really close to the sun, they let off the gas (apparently) and the spaceship (with a mass the size of MANHATTAN attached to the front) stops. Then, they activate the bomb, and fly away. They have four minutes before the bomb activates its rockets to get away. Why four minutes? Who knows. Then, the bomb flies INTO the sun…
The bomb, with a mass of Manhattan, sitting that close to the sun, needs MASSIVE rockets to propel it into the sun… I mean… what?
I can understand not understanding inertia, but gravity? How can you be alive in the twenty first century and be a science fiction writer… without understanding… GRAVITY?
The absurdities are beyond belief. Someone GAVE THEM MONEY to make this. Real money. These are grown human adults with college educations (presumably) who think that if you are flying towards THE SUN with a bomb THE SIZE OF MANHATTAN strapped to the front of your ship at 29,000 kilometers per hour and you “let off the gas” (or something… shut the engine down? Who knows, it is never established what kind of propulsion they have… it can be too sophisticated, the journey takes months and months… the Zombie Movie guy’s hair grows from a crew cut to Jesus Length during the trip) it will stop and hang there, somehow.
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