The Andromeda Strain (2008)

TV. I'd been anticipating this remake of the classic movie The Andromeda Strain (1991) because we’re talking about Michael Crichton’s first bestselling novel (1969). I read the book at age 13 or 14 and it has remained with me, along with Fantastic Voyage (1966 with a remake in 2010) and 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), as the three foremost masterpieces of late-60s science-fiction literature and cinema. I was concerned to hear the remake would be a product of the Sci-Fi Channel (historically a purveyor of low-budget mealworm-ridden schlock). Early press said the remake was hamhanded, brassy, and preoccupied with virulent as well as violent body counts. (These charges are true: Video of the initial recovery team’s death is played five times and several snuff fests with a jacked-up rock-music soundtrack have been added to the script.) I watched it anyway -- and I'm glad I did. For one thing, the top-secret Wildlife biomedical laboratory deserved better than 1960s computer technology -- and this remake delivered on many of my dreams: x-ray-film-like laptops, virtual-3D touchscreens, natural-language voice-based command-and-response, etc. (The scriptwriter may have simply cadged these ideas from Star Trek: The Next Generation and The Minority Report but, if so, the Sci-Fi Channel folks did a great job of bringing the technology to life.) As I feared, the acting was yeomanlike -- unimaginative, yet no one tripped over their shoelaces, with the most talent glimmering through Gen. Mancheck (Andre Braugher) and Dr. Angela Noyce (Christa Miller). The script proved better than I expected at presenting seminal scientific concepts from the book and a few updated issues (esp. national security, paranoia, etc. -- though the premise of a black hole was singularly unnecessary). (What is it about the Sci-Fi Channel and black holes?) The Clinton/Bush mashup of a president (Ted Whittal) had faith in his star scientists' professional acumen and a great line ("I'm not going to risk going to war on some half-baked evidence and a hunch") as did Dr. Noyce about our mortality ("There's something to be said for its linearity. If we could examine all of our choices like a box of chocolates, what would we have at stake?"). TV reporter Jack Nash (Eric McCormack) had the meatiest role, even if he was supposed to be in rehab for cocaine abuse and fell off the wagon. Having escaped a nefarious government assassin yet facing imminent microbial death, he ventures a prayer and forswears drugs. A pot-smoking good-ol' girl fleeing the same death later offers him a toke: “No, I took a vow.” The climactic ending in the Wildfire facility gets mangled with two unnecessary scientists’ deaths and a rescue crawl that’s both mawkish and gruesome. (Sitting up lets you reach a computer display better than laying down. Chicken fingers anyone? And what is it with nuclear countdowns always ending with 7 seconds on the clock?) As is common to Sci-Fi fare, the remake’s explosions all look hokey as do the microbial advance and retreat (followed by the inevitable “We did it!”). The ending is a wakeup call as to how politicians are never content to leave science to the scientists. I give the classic 4.5 stars and this fairly riveting remake 4 stars.