User Reviews

Sphere is a science fiction film that starts off with a tremendously fascinating story and ignores all of the possibilities that it entails. Four people (you know the drill – a psychologist (Dustin Hoffman), a mathematician (Samuel L. Jackson), a biochemist (Sharon Stone) and an astrophysicist (Liev Schreiber)) are flown out to the middle of the ocean on a top-secret missions (even they don't know where they're going). We would be just as confused as they were about the details of their mission if we had never seen the previews, but even though we already know what they're going to find out there, it's just as interesting to learn about the details of this ship that has been found on the bottom of the ocean, and that appears to have been sitting there for 300 years (well, okay, 288). The story keeps getting better and better as we learn that there is a hum coming from the ship, indicating that there is still something running inside it, and then even more fascinating revelations once we are taken inside the ship.

There can be no doubt that Sphere contains some truly interesting and entertaining elements, and that things like the acting are just as superb as we would expect from such a spectacular cast, but as the movie progresses, we begin to realize how little the film is going to reveal. I can't say that I wasn't completely enraptured for at the least the first hour of the film, but there were just as many bitterly disappointing things about it as there were good things. Dustin Hoffman and Samuel L. Jackson, in particular, delivered absolutely brilliant performances in this film, delivering some of the best entertainment in the entire film by themselves. There is a mildly interesting but completely unconvincing ex-romantic tension between Sharon Stone's character, Dr. Beth Halperin, and Dustin Hoffman's character, Dr. Norman Goodman, that is there for little other reason than to complicate the lives of the characters as they try to solve the mystery of this undersea ship.

(spoilers) It's really too bad that the movie completely falls on its face in the second half, because the first half of the film is excellent and undeniably entertaining. There's nothing like a bit of time travel and the suggestion of extraterrestrial life to keep you entertained, and it is definitely a great scene when we find out that the ship is a human ship. This is one of the many things in the film that really makes you think. The thing that makes a great film is that it inspires thought. This is probably the one thing that all of the great films have in common with each other. There are surely a lot of things about Sphere that really make you think, which is another reason that the first half of the film is so good. We see that it's a human ship, which opens a whole new area of possibilities for the film. Harry (Samuel L. Jackson) speculates on the fact that the last entry in the ship's log is an entry into an `Unknown entry event,' indicating that they will never reach the surface to reveal what they've found.

There is also a possibly over-extensive excursion into the realm of the psychological element in the film, as the characters are all made to face their fears, some of which are not just your average fears, such as Harry's strange fear of finishing 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea. The special effects are definitely nothing to brag about, but there are some interesting scenes that take place in the deep ocean, such as the death of Teeny Fletcher (hey, she's black, she had it coming, right?) in the midst of a mass of strange sea creatures, as well as the scene with the thousands of squid eggs. Weird looking things, I've wondered since I saw the film what kind of props they used for that scene. The conversation with `Jerry' is unfittingly childish, but there is definitely a significant element of tension introduced when Jerry gets mad, as well as the scene where Norman contemplated the implications of Jerry's expression of emotions, indicating his ability to get mad.

There are undeniably a lot of interesting things about Sphere, and it surely has the power to entertain, but it goes off the track later in the film, maybe because it tried to answer too many of its questions. There are some unanswerable things in the film, and the movie deals with them by having the characters have a weakly-written discussion about their fears and questions, and their ultimate decision to `forget' what they know using the power that they seem to have gained from the sphere. While this answers the question of how it could have been an unknown entry event when they all made it to the surface, it's probably the weakest ending that the film could possibly have had.

As a strange twist on the science fiction genre, Sphere succeeds, although only in the first half. Like Hollow Man, Sphere could have and should have been a much better film. The unfortunate fact about the film is that it contains a lot of very interesting and very entertaining things that are surely worth watching, but the disappointing ending almost makes them not even worth seeing.

It's like a children's story. Full of illogical plot twists and the necessity for the audience to take ridiculous leaps of faith to justify what appears on the screen and the reactions of the character to the situations. There is no stimulus to think anywhere beyond the confines of the film... Other than the thought "what the heck is going on?". And in this case, that question arises for the wrong reasons. It simply fails to stay believable within the boundaries of the universe built for the story.

Yes, there are suspenseful moments and some terrifying images, but even those moments are diffused by the knowledge presented in the film that 'all is not what it seems'. And this is the same story told many times before going all the way back to 'Forbidden Planet' and the 'monsters of the id'.

The take-away from the movie is... your perception is your reality. And sometimes it's scary. Or is it: 'your perception is EVERYONES reality?" OMG that really make you think! ... NOT.

I take offense to the reviews that suggest people who did not like this movie are intellectually challenged. If you found this movie to be stimulating to you intellectually.. may I also recommend 'The Berenstain Bear's and the Spooky Old Tree'... I'm sure that one will will have you on your toes the whole time and weeping for it's beauty at your next book club meeting.

I know it's difficult to make a movie... and there was a great effort and much skill and intelligence put in to making 'Sphere'... It simply doesn't deliver on the entertainment nor intellectual fronts.

"I borrowed from good writers ... like Rod Serling" one of the characters exclaims in the middle of the film. Do I ever wish.

Sphere is based on not-one-of-Crichton's best efforts. Instead, go see "Andromeda Strain," which, although long and slow-paced in classic Robert Wise directorial style, creates a real atmosphere as a team of scientists struggles in an isolation facility to save humanity from a deadly virus.

The film is full of cheap scares (like women-sea divers jumping up and screaming when a skeletonized human astronaut is found, one of those stereotypes). And that's pretty much all it tries to deliver.

A bunch of diver-scientists discover a US spaceship from the future. It contains a mysterious sphere, which grants them the power to materialize their imagination to reality. Of course a storm traps them under water (in a great B-flick like "Deep Blue Sea," that old plot device is tolerable), and some of them die under the influence of the hallucinations/creations. Back to the surface, the survivors decide to take away the power granted by the sphere - or is one of them cheating? Sequel time! Fortunately, they did not bother making one.

The movie is mediocre SF fare based on a mediocre SF novel (although Crichton has written some great ones). It replaces genuine wonder with in-your-face sounds or flashes to make you jump in your seat. The characters are so routine you wish they'd just die and get on with it. There is some competent action, and for a while (middle third) the film has spell-binding imagery, so it still gets a 5: watchable, but not really satisfying even on the first viewing.

The psychiatrist Dr. Norman Goodman (Dustin Hoffman) travels from San Diego to the middle of nowhere in the Pacific Ocean to help survivors of a plane crash. Soon he learns that he was actually summoned by Captain Harold C. Barnes (Peter Coyote) to team-up with the biochemistry Dr. Elizabeth 'Beth' Halperin (Sharon Stone); the mathematician Dr. Harry Adams (Samuel L. Jackson); and the astrophysical Dr. Ted Fielding (Liev Schreiber) to investigate an unknown life form in a spacecraft that crashed two hundred and eighty-eight years ago.

The team saturates with helium to travel to a base close to the UFO 1,000 feet below the ocean and operated by the military Alice 'Teeny' Fletcher (Queen Latifah) and Jane Edmunds (Marga Gómez). Barnes, Norman, Beth, Harry and Ted go to the spaceship and discover that it is terrestrial from the future. Further, the computer indicates an Unknown Entry Event, probably a Black Hole that brought the spaceship to the past. Harry uses logic and concludes that if the crew had never heard anything about their discovery in the present days, they will probably dies. But they all are intrigued with a mysterious sphere inside the spacecraft. There is a storm in the surface and the fleet must leave the area, leaving Barnes and his team without communication. Harry sneaks out and enters in the sphere and then his manifestations come to life threatening the group. Will they survive to the power of the mysterious sphere?

I saw "Sphere" on the late 90's but I did not like it. Yesterday I saw it again, now on DVD, and this time I found it a sci-fi with an intelligent story but with a terrible direction. The greatest problem are the characters that are unpleasant, unlikable and emotionally detached and without feelings.

The situation of the fleet leaving the area due to a storm but without leaving a submarine in the area to give support to the group is also a great flaw in the story. This screenplay in the hands of Spielberg or James Cameron could have been a great film. My vote is six.

Title (Brazil): "Esfera" ("Sphere")

Michael Crichton, a science-fiction novelist and screenplay writer for several of his own adaptations has had many of his ideas become successful and iconic pieces in cinema. The best of Mr. Crichton's work is by far everyone's favorite prehistoric predator film, Jurassic Park (1993). That and Westworld (1973) twenty years before. There's something about Crichton's work that has many of the same motifs that show up in a lot of his other written works. One of the most notable elements is the discovery of a new science by humans and it ends up becoming more than humanity can handle. Re-emphasizing this again is in this Crichton adaptation that went largely unnoticed. Was it because it was bad? No but as a final product, there's a lot left to be desired with this sci- fi thriller.

The story to this movie is about a group of doctors in different fields that travel to the bottom of the ocean to analyze a UFO that has something mysterious inside. The mysterious plot device that's inside the ship is a giant perfectly shaped golden sphere. After visiting it, strange things begin occurring on the ship and it's up to the small crew to figure it out. Directed by Barry Levinson (who has produced other Crichton adaptations) shows that he has competent direction in how he wanted the story to play out. Yet his pair of writers didn't seem to know how to make it work to the fullest extent. The writers on board for this production were Stephen Hauser (which was his only credit) and Paul Attanasio. Both of which flesh out the characters and do create some high-strung tension scenes with minor psychological elements but when it comes to explaining the orb, they miss it almost entirely.

The underwater crew is made up of Dustin Hoffman (a psychiatrist), Sharon Stone (a biochemist), Samuel L. Jackson (a mathematician) and Liev Schreiber (a doctor in physics) and two operators; Peter Coyote and Queen Latifah. Of these characters, only Latifah (who has a minor role) seemed slightly out of place; all the rest act fine in their roles. That means distinctive personalities and charms. The actor who viewers would probably find the most likable is Hoffman who has a knack for being mostly nonchalant through each situation he's put into. I guess shrinks are supposed to be this calm? Not sure, but it gives him the right amount of charm. The connection these characters have is that they were all associated with Hoffman's role. Funny how popular 80s singer Huey Lewis even had a small scene stealing moment at the beginning of the movie. Random but a treat.

The sphere plot device is also a treat when things start rolling (pardon the pun). However, this is exactly when the problems begin to arise. In order for strange events to happen, there's got to be reasons to back up and justify these moments. For this case, there is only one explanation given amongst a slew of other questions that go unanswered. One thing that really threw me off was when Hoffman's character discovers a cabinet worth of a specific item. Who stocked that thing? I could see if it was a mind game or hallucination but it was for real. Tell me who had the time to do that? I have to admit, moments like those will keep its audience guessing and with Hoffman's character being a shrink, the psychological aspect to the film does help make the tenseness quite intellectual. The only problem is that parts of it only theorized possible reasons but never gave definitive solutions. These of which were all based on observation.

The only other negative part to the presentation of this movie is how it deliberately splits up its acts into chapters. There is no need, for two reasons. One being that, the audience will figure out when the next act is because each "chapter" if you want to call it that fades out to black. The other reason is that giving a title for the next sequence can somewhat spoil the upcoming surprising scene that audiences may not see coming. Instead, audiences are presented with giant bold print stating exactly what's headed their way. Why go through the trouble of shooting yourself in the foot like that? But enough on that, the last bits of the film still work in its favor. This belongs to the cinematography shot by Adam Greenberg (The Terminator (1984) and Rush Hour (1998)) and the music composed by Elliot Goldenthal. Since Greenberg has been the director of photography before for bigger projects, he shows that can effectively conceal the illusion during the underwater scenes. As for music, Goldenthal who isn't always the most memorable actually surprises this time. That means creating themes for certain aspects of the film, which includes creepy piano keys and quite wondrous sounding strings. It really stuck.

The film has competent acting, cinematography, music, interesting psychological elements thrown in and some tense thrills. However, the writing sorely lacks in clearing up much of the plot device that is directly involved in the story other than giving a small assumption only based on observation. That and the chapter segments are a bit unnecessary.

A largely disappointing thriller adapted from a book by Michael Crichton, which is both overlong and boring at times, although not totally without merit. The film starts off well with the initial underwater exploration of the alien craft, and the sphere itself, a most impressive creation. Sadly after this set-up, it seems that nobody really knew where to go, so instead it becomes standard run-of-the-mill fare with the members of the undersea station getting bumped off one by one (although the varied deaths, including jellyfish attack, fire, etc. are impressive and well-staged). The confusing storyline involves the alien sphere channelling people's unconscious thoughts and fears and bringing them to life, thus turning everybody on each other and killing themselves. It sounds more exciting than it is.

The big budget is impressive, both in the underwater visuals and special effects, which are limited and kept to a minimum rather than over the top as per usual. The photography is interesting, the sets varied, and the action, when it occurs, is accompanied by an old-fashioned music score which adds to the excitement. Sadly, for the most part the film just sort of meanders on with not much occurring and nobody getting any closer to discovering the truth.

Dustin Hoffman is good, as expected, as the lead, although his heart doesn't seem to be in it. Sharon Stone is merely adequate as the female crew member, sometimes embarrassing when she supposedly loses it. Samuel L. Jackson is once again excellent as the first crew member to go inside the sphere, who may or may not be a villain; his edgy turn is one of the film's highlights. Liev Schreiber is a pretty ineffectual although likable scientist who doesn't seem to figure much. Peter Coyote has a minor role as an official who gets trapped in a closing door and cut in two (like in DEEP STAR SIX). Rapper Queen Latifah is unnoticeable in a very minor bit part as a technician.

There are some effective scares, like the arrival of the giant squid, plus the genuinely scary attacks by water snakes which lunge at the camera. Also some nice touches, like the book that Jackson reads that's blank after page 87 (probably the cleverest bit of the film). Sadly the long-expected ending is rushed and a disappointment, relying on that old, old cliché of a bomb timer ticking down as the participants rush to escape, and culminating in a huge explosion that looks nice but seems to be a weak way of tying up all the loose ends. Although SPHERE has its moments, it's undoubtedly a bad film, a flop that had people staying away from the cinema in droves. I would recommend it only to the most dedicated sci-fi fan who might get a few thrills from it and doesn't mind wasting a couple of hours in the process.

It borrows heavily from Solaris (the book, not the movie). The entire logic of the movie is based on it but it falls flat in some places. The problem is that while the idea is intriguing, the exposition is plain boring and the pacing is far better in the first half than in the second one.

There are a few plot twists, however, all the end, you are left with a "is this all there is?" feeling.

Plus, while Solaris raised philosophical questions about the nature of existence and the limits of logic, not to mention have some really disturbing and intense scenes, this falls flat.

I've watched the movie for the first half on my iPad but then, I've simply left it in the background and did something else. This is one of those movies with a great potential but dumbed down so it can be a summer blockbuster.

Plus, the characters are 2D archetypes. You have the serious US Navy Captain that is always all business and too cool for school. You have the care free lady genius that is a bit crazy compared to the rest. You have the highly intelligent but insecure genius. You have the an afro- American dude that is considered a prodigy yet acts like he wants to win a popularity award.

Therefore, a contrast is created. The idea is good and the inspiration is clear. It could have been a lot more. But it is dumbed down to the level that I'd rather watch Man in Black than this. You don't get a smart setup and give it a stupid execution. If you want a simplistic movie, go with a simple plot. Don't go all metaphysical and then break it up with the execution.

It's not your average dumb popcorn movie, so audiences stayed away, apparently. Making them think gets them nervous - that's my only explanation, because Sphere is a great psychological sci-fi thriller.

SPOILERS!!

Not everything fits together (why exactly does Sharon Stone decide to go in the Sphere? And if they have this great power why can't they magic themselves top-side or stop the explosives?) but the story remains suitably grounded and tense throughout, with some nice FX work that doesn't rub your face in CGI.

The time-travel stretch may alienate some viewers (no pun intended) but I thought it a nice little joke that something circular (the Sphere) comes back around to the beginning of the story, creating a time loop. Watch the movie and you'll see what I mean. Underrated and flawed, Sphere is still a decent sci-fi with some nice performances from Stone and Hoffman.

Giving it a '7' is probably a little generous. However, it was suspenseful the first time I saw it, and the production values are too good to be a "B" flick. The lighting was a little dark, even for trying to evoke a scary environment... I want to see some of that technology, even if it is fake! Nice to see some big cameos... Queen Latifa, Huey Lewis, Liev Schreiber. Peter Coyote should stick to narrating Nature documentaries... as an actor, he has only two emotions; sullen, and over-the-top irate. And I was a little puzzled about the design of the craft that brought the sphere to Earth... why did it look like (sonar image) the tail section of a giant airplane? Wouldn't that have gotten torn to shreds when it went through the black hole? And how can a craft that withstands going thru a black hole get blown up by a mere liquid hydrogen explosion?

I thought I would comment on this one, because I thought it was one of the most God-awful movies to come out in 1998. It is by far the worst Michael Crichton-based movie yet. Perhaps it's because I had high hopes (the book is one of my favorites), but I cannot remember the last time I saw a movie as jarbled, disorganized, and ultimately non-interesting as this one.

This is a special effects movie with no special effects. The most high-tech shots are the opening credits, for God's sake! The plot requires (spoiler warning) an underwater habitat, a gigantic submerged spaceship, a humongous alien sphere, several underwater creatures and finally a giant squid attack. All of these elements are handled with incredible incompetence. The habitat is filled entirely with grey---the navy is smart enough to put color in habitats like this, to keep people from going crazy. Nobody wants to spend much time in a place like this, especially a movie audience. The squid attack is so bad its laughable---we never see the squid! Imagine the T-Rex scene in Jurrasic Park if it began with a tree shaking and then stopped. In Sphere, we basically get a blip on the radar screen, then the camera moves around a lot.

The writers try to remain faithful to the plot, but get so many critical points wrong that the whole things falls apart long before we see any squids. Its almost as if they read certain chapters of the book, then tried to guess what the rest was about. The final act, when all is explained, made perfect sense to me in the book, but in hopelessly incomprehensible in the movie. And the ending takes a *major* turn from the book---what was that about! I have no trouble when movies make intelligent changes from their inspirations, but if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

Barry Levinson is a good director, and I'm sure he will make a better movie some day. Perhaps he should stick to comedy. Or perhaps he thought he would need to do a big-budget movie to go along with the indie hit Wag the Dog. Either way, he gets a crucial point wrong here: What made the book Sphere so compelling to read wasn't squids or jellyfish, but our fascination with the Sphere itself---Where did it come from? What is its purpose? Neither the book nor the movie answers those questions completely, but the difference is the movie never seems to care.

Don't bother.

The writing is terrible - the characters' motives and actions make no sense whatsoever. As a viewer we are asked to accept so much incredibly bad stuff . . . yeah, it makes perfect sense that an 'alien' would communicate by mapping a keyboard onto a sphere and numbering the keys in a spiral fashion starting from the center. Perfect sense. Or that you could mistranslate 'My name is Harry' into 'My name is Jerry' but not mistranslate anything else that he was saying.

Or how about the 'inevitable' conclusion that the fact nobody knows what happens in the future means that everyone died? I'd say it's a lot more likely that information of that nature would at the least be kept confidential, or (as they weakly wrapped up the plot) simply not spread beyond the surviving crew members Don't get me started on the other plot holes. What the hell happened to the dark-haired woman? Oh there's a noise outside. Huh, it's her dead body. What could have done this to her? NOBODY EVER KNOWS OR BOTHERS TO FIND OUT.

And the dialogue was really awful too. 'You know me. I believe everything'. There were very few lines in this movie that sounded like a real person would ever speak them. Samuel Jackson's character was a mishmash of weirdness - he spent far too much of the movie seeming like some sort of evil agent of the sphere, when it turns out that he's just a raging idiot. Well played.

What really bothers me is that underneath all this crap, is a halfway decent idea. I have not read Crighton's novel, for all I know it is tolerable or even decent. But whatever it is, this adaptation is absolutely godawful. I feel stupider for having watched it; I feel stupider for being a member of a race which has other individuals who would rate this miscarriage of filmography as anything other than utter dreck.

WARNING - SPOILERS

Who on earth managed to talk Hoffman, Stone and Jackson into taking part in this dreadful hogwash? I can only assume the cheques were mighty indeed.

The story seems to be a clumsy mash-up of almost every sci-fi or horror film you can think of: Event Horizon, 2001, Andromida Strain, The Shining, The Abyss, Alien - even the TV series Red Dwarf (Back to Reality & Better Than Life) gets shoehorned in. The list just goes on and on. In fact, this film could have a decent second life as a board game. Contestants simply spot yet another cinematic reference to get their next roll of the dice.

The film's jarringly episodic editing and the lack of any coherent narrative flow makes me suspect a great deal of this clunker was left on the cutting room floor; and that, trust me, is a good thing. I just wish they'd left a great deal more of it there.

The plot is trite, the action is dull, the dialogue is dreadful, the characterisations are poor, the direction is ham-fisted and the entire thing is badly miscast. The cast seem to be improvising quite a bit, and although I have seen this work very well in other settings, I'm afraid here it just looked like a bad night at the your local amateur dramatic society.

And then, just when you think this film couldn't possibly get any worse - WARNING! MAJOR SPOILER ALERT! - they simply use their shiny new super powers to make everything OK. I mean, jeez, c'mon guys!

It's a dreadful clunker; it really is. Best avoided.