This week, thanks to a sweet Black Friday deal, I saved £8.75 per month on my mobile phone bill and got a free 6 month subscription to Disney+ thrown in. And you better believe I am here for all the cringe Disney Channel Original Movies and Straight to Video / DVD stuff. I have already saved so many movies to my watchlist, I never knew how many odd and obscure films there are on there! So to celebrate, I picked Race to Witch Mountain as my first Disney+ watch, which made it into my watch list for being one of the 10 worst Sci-FI movies available on D+ apparently...?
Former WWF Heavyweight Champion, The Rock, is a cab driver in Las Vegas, and obviously has some links to a rather shady past (and I don't just mean jobbing to Goldberg at Backlash 2003) when he has to deal with two hired goons trying to punk him out. This momentary distraction provides the opportunity for Seth (Alexander Ludwig) and Sara (Anna Sophia Robb) to sneak inside his cab and pay him to drive them to the middle of a desert. Revealing themselves to be aliens crash landed on Earth, and being chased by a nasty Halo Spartan looking guy, they convince Jack Bruno (Dwayne Johnson) to help them get back to their ship. But Dr Octopus from Spiderman (Ciaran Hinds) has other ideas and would very much like to find out what the kids gooey insides look like... Discovering that their ship is being held at Witch Mountain and picking up Scientist and UFO-ologist Dr. Friedman (Carla Gugino) along the way to help them get there, the adults and the kids try to break into a top secret government facility that doesn't exist, and eventually the kids, after being taken prisoner by Doc Oc, but broken free when the Spartan comes looking for them, find their flying saucer and manage to escape, vaporising their Spartan pursuer in the process.
Full disclaimer; I haven't seen the original that this film is a remake of, so I'm going into this with no preconceptions and I don't know if it classes as a guilty pleasure or not, but I actually like Dwayne Johnson. I've seen him in a handful of films now, and this is slightly earlier on in his career but I rate him as an actor. He's a little rusty, a little bit green in this film but he does a more than passable job here. Everybody actually, does a good job; Ciaran Hinds is a natural bad guy and is just so good. The kids, Alexander and Anna, are both really great and considering how poor a job Taylor Lautner did in last weeks film, it's amazing he goes on to be a greater star than either of these pair... Carla Gugino was also really good and played the perfect pivot roll of a starstruck (excuse the pun...) UFO-ologist and authoritive Scientist really well. No weak links at all in the casting line up.
BUT this film made it on to the top 10 worst Sci-fi's on Disney+ for a reason... apparently. And whilst everything was enjoyable; the plot played out fine if not slightly predictable, the cinematography was fine, the acting was fine, but it does get a bit pedestrian at times and it's a slightly stale; 'aliens want to get home' formula that has been done before a handful of times. There's nothing beyond remarkable here, and it's never going to take home any Oscars. Everything is above par yes, but it just doesn't quite go that extra mile that turns a good movie into a great one.
BUUUT did that ruin the movie? Absolutely not. The Rock is always enjoyable to watch, in pretty much everything I've seen him in, he just has a natural cinematic chemistry and despite being slightly wet behind the ears here, he will go on to be really great in Rampage, Jumanji and Skyscraper and even if I'm being really mean here, really putting everything about this movie through the wringer, it's difficult to spot the bobbly bits. Every part of it was more than acceptable, and whilst not the most spectacular blockbuster movie ever this was an enjoyable if not slightly pedestrian and predictable film. And also a final bonus point for suggesting at, but not shoehorning in a completely needless and counter-productive romantic liaison between Jack and Dr. Friedman. God I hate it when movies do that. I am feeling my first 4 out 5 for this. Good job people.
