'Millennium' still stands out after all these years as a phenomenal premise for a science fiction film. Perhaps that's why fans like me keep watching it over and over again hoping maybe this time the film makers will get it right! But of course it never changes.
Given this film's IMDb ratings, others seem to agree, this film has a phenomenal premise.
The plot: Kris Kristofferson stars as an investigator of a mysterious mid air collision with many paranormal aspects. The oddest of which is why a bombshell like Cheryl Ladd would buy him dinner and take him to bed the same night.
A Nobel Laureate is also investigating this and other mysterious plane crashes.
The explanation is simple, time travelers from 1,000 years in the future are abducting healthy people from the past fated to die in plane crashes. The plane and replacement dead bodies are then sent back into the past without causing any harmful changes to the space time continuum. Hence Cheryl Ladd is merely a femme fetal from the future attempting to clear up any inconsistencies, but inevitably causes even more time paradoxes.
You might remember how a similar premise was used in 'The Time Shifters.' This is a great story! Too bad it's executed so poorly. Aside from the lack luster production quality, FX, and acting, the devil is in the details of the story.
First off, if time traveling is causing so many time paradoxes, why are they sending back agents whom will cause even more troubles? Sure it moves the story along but it seems silly to do it? Second, many of these errors seem just plain silly. For example, a futuristic stun gun is left in the wreckage and found by Kristopherson. In order to correct this Ladd goes back in time to get the stunner but actually leaves half of it with Kristopherson and speaks to him. Hence making his more convinced of paranormal activities! Third, it's later revealed that at age 7 Kristopherson was aboard one of the hijacked flights and survived the crash. And he's just remembering this NOW? This just seems tacked on. Sure he was a kids but surely a 7 year old would remember encountering time travelers on an airplane and being the sole survivor of the crash! This is also sill as I was expecting the Nobel Laureate to be the boy from the 1960s. It would better explain why he was so obsessed with the paranormal plain crashes.
Fourth, the film does explain that they cannot visit the same time twice. Yet after realizing Kristopherson will bring his evidence to the Nobel Laureate, Ladd attempt to stop this by confronting the two of them at his house. Couldn't she just travel to before the two even met and steal the evidence? Why confront them at all? This idiots could really use a time machine.
It's also unrealistic how the passengers being taken off these planes just calmly go along with everything. In real life they'd be freaking out. "Oh my God! What this fxxx is happening? I'm not doing anything you robots tell me to!" And let's NOT forget about the shoddy sci-fi production quality. These future leaders live in a mat painting of a giant metal pyramid. And the leaders look like the Cenobites from the 'Hellraiser' series. No kidding. That's exactly what they look like.
The future robot workers look like 1950's silver faced humans playing robots. Either that or villains from 'Power Rangers.' My friends laughed these characters off the screen when they saw this.
As for the dialogue? That's truly historically memorable. Ladd insults a robot with, "Your mother was a cash register." It's comeback? "And she turned a tidy profit." This is the type of dialogue your in for throughout the 90 minutes! So many of the scenes come across as just plain awkward. Especially the lack of chemistry between lovers Cheryl Ladd and Kris Kristopherson. We almost feel as embarrassed watching this as these actors musts have felt doing this.
Another historic scene is how in the future wall mounted lasers conveniently zap away discarded cigarette butts. (much more practical than switching to the patch) However Ladd forgets this in the past and just casually throws away her butt onto her fellow dinners at a restaurant. Maybe that's why everyone's dying in the future? They're all still addicted to tobacco! Installing lasers on your walls just to get rid of your cigarette butts isn't the first sign of addiction. It's the LAST sign of addiction! It's still unclear if the wall laser aspect was intentionally funny.
The "paranormal" aspects of the crash are lack luster as a build up. Recall the great build up for sci-fi films like 'Flight of the Navigator' and 'Deja Vu.' Here, it's just not the intriguing.
In conclusion, 'Millennium' IS worth your time just for the phenomenal premise alone! However you'll probably come away frustrated like I was with how poorly it was executed.
Given this film's IMDb ratings, others seem to agree, this film has a phenomenal premise.
The plot: Kris Kristofferson stars as an investigator of a mysterious mid air collision with many paranormal aspects. The oddest of which is why a bombshell like Cheryl Ladd would buy him dinner and take him to bed the same night.
A Nobel Laureate is also investigating this and other mysterious plane crashes.
The explanation is simple, time travelers from 1,000 years in the future are abducting healthy people from the past fated to die in plane crashes. The plane and replacement dead bodies are then sent back into the past without causing any harmful changes to the space time continuum. Hence Cheryl Ladd is merely a femme fetal from the future attempting to clear up any inconsistencies, but inevitably causes even more time paradoxes.
You might remember how a similar premise was used in 'The Time Shifters.' This is a great story! Too bad it's executed so poorly. Aside from the lack luster production quality, FX, and acting, the devil is in the details of the story.
First off, if time traveling is causing so many time paradoxes, why are they sending back agents whom will cause even more troubles? Sure it moves the story along but it seems silly to do it? Second, many of these errors seem just plain silly. For example, a futuristic stun gun is left in the wreckage and found by Kristopherson. In order to correct this Ladd goes back in time to get the stunner but actually leaves half of it with Kristopherson and speaks to him. Hence making his more convinced of paranormal activities! Third, it's later revealed that at age 7 Kristopherson was aboard one of the hijacked flights and survived the crash. And he's just remembering this NOW? This just seems tacked on. Sure he was a kids but surely a 7 year old would remember encountering time travelers on an airplane and being the sole survivor of the crash! This is also sill as I was expecting the Nobel Laureate to be the boy from the 1960s. It would better explain why he was so obsessed with the paranormal plain crashes.
Fourth, the film does explain that they cannot visit the same time twice. Yet after realizing Kristopherson will bring his evidence to the Nobel Laureate, Ladd attempt to stop this by confronting the two of them at his house. Couldn't she just travel to before the two even met and steal the evidence? Why confront them at all? This idiots could really use a time machine.
It's also unrealistic how the passengers being taken off these planes just calmly go along with everything. In real life they'd be freaking out. "Oh my God! What this fxxx is happening? I'm not doing anything you robots tell me to!" And let's NOT forget about the shoddy sci-fi production quality. These future leaders live in a mat painting of a giant metal pyramid. And the leaders look like the Cenobites from the 'Hellraiser' series. No kidding. That's exactly what they look like.
The future robot workers look like 1950's silver faced humans playing robots. Either that or villains from 'Power Rangers.' My friends laughed these characters off the screen when they saw this.
As for the dialogue? That's truly historically memorable. Ladd insults a robot with, "Your mother was a cash register." It's comeback? "And she turned a tidy profit." This is the type of dialogue your in for throughout the 90 minutes! So many of the scenes come across as just plain awkward. Especially the lack of chemistry between lovers Cheryl Ladd and Kris Kristopherson. We almost feel as embarrassed watching this as these actors musts have felt doing this.
Another historic scene is how in the future wall mounted lasers conveniently zap away discarded cigarette butts. (much more practical than switching to the patch) However Ladd forgets this in the past and just casually throws away her butt onto her fellow dinners at a restaurant. Maybe that's why everyone's dying in the future? They're all still addicted to tobacco! Installing lasers on your walls just to get rid of your cigarette butts isn't the first sign of addiction. It's the LAST sign of addiction! It's still unclear if the wall laser aspect was intentionally funny.
The "paranormal" aspects of the crash are lack luster as a build up. Recall the great build up for sci-fi films like 'Flight of the Navigator' and 'Deja Vu.' Here, it's just not the intriguing.
In conclusion, 'Millennium' IS worth your time just for the phenomenal premise alone! However you'll probably come away frustrated like I was with how poorly it was executed.