Deep Impact - 1998

Deep Impact - 1998 (US)

A spectacular and world impact movie on a recurring fear the unknown from outer space seen from three different perspectives.

The movie has good rhythm and spectacular photography. The incoming slow Armageddon is coming by the usual big comet that promises to annihilate all the current life on hearth. Not an original plot, but this time we have a different perspective. There is the very young astronomical scientist discovering the comet and becoming famous (and also growing up very fast as a man); there is a crew of young and old astronauts that sees the issue as a mission to accomplish; there is a journalist that is all toward the career goals and has in this tragedy a moment of incredible boost of her work chances and career.

I like how the plot went toward all the story providing these different points of view: different levels of the society act and react in different ways, with different purposes, with different outcomes.

I find a bit weak that the cockiness of the presidential guards against the journalist ceases so strongly as soon as she has an agreement with the political administration on command.

Another thing I didn't like is all the emotional stuff going on with the young scientist. It's a deadly situation and they keep playing the card "I want to stay with my parents" even if this means sure death. In a good movie I'm expecting to see a parent in this situation forcing the offspring to keep going on and have a future and not the opposite. I imagine this has the favour of a part of the audience, but I prefer something less sweet and more plausible.
I like how the relationship of the astronaut is depicted. They mixed very well old style and new style together creating a good tension between two approaches to the mission that end up enriching themselves instead of breaking apart the mission itself.
The part related to the journalist is nice, but I think that the writer was too undecided with this character: is she a career oriented person that doesn't care to step on everyone else head or is she a professional who uses her own moral to evaluate her steps? I think for her they wanted both and that this weakened the character. I didn't see an inner evolution that can provide what they depicted for this character.
I was expecting all the "unforeseen issues": this type of movies often like to play very many unexpected events to made the resolver of the situation a god like human who play extremely smartly or extremely heroically. Or maybe because no movies end with the real destruction of the earth I had practically no surprise of the end of the movie. Personally the quality of the images in the space are compensating the lack of originality of the story.
The president, portrayed by a nice Morgan Freeman, is too much a sensitive human and not very credible, but I have to say that in the end of the 90s this was more credible than nowadays, so I won't complain too much.
Personally there was too emotional stuff on the story, but it's a movie that is nice to watch.

My vote: 3/5