"We are definitely not alone..."      

SPHERE (PG-13) 

Reviewed February 16, 1998 - Check out the Sphere web site.

Based on a novel by Michael Crichton, directed by Barry Levinson, and starring Dustin Hoffman, Sharon Stone and Samuel L. Jackson, Sphere is a film that (at least on paper) shows a lot of promise.  When a boat laying fiber-optic cable across the Pacific Ocean runs into a 300-year-old spacecraft lying 1000 feet underwater, a special 'contact' team is sent down to investigate.  On the team are a psychologist (Hoffman), a biologist (Stone), a mathematician (Jackson), a nuclear physicist (Liev Schreiber) and a naval officer (Peter Coyote), and we quickly learn that although the ship has been underwater for 300 years, it is still fully intact...and it's humming.

The premise here is an intriguing one--Contact meets The Abyss, if you will--and it definitely draws you in during its first half hour.  Driven by sharp writing and the promise of an encounter with intelligent life, Sphere gives you the impression that you're about to see something good.  Well, keep reading because sometimes impressions can fool you.  What starts off as a sharp, engaging story in Sphere quickly degenerates into what is effectively a frantic, confused monster movie.  Killer jellyfish and giant squid, even when presented as manifestations of the mind, are nevertheless just killer jellyfish and giant squid!  Equally disappointing is the weak treatment given to the golden sphere encountered by the team, or the intelligent being "Jerry" who communicates via the team's computer system.  Though these were both interesting subjects in themselves, they are never fully explored in Sphere, which instead chooses to present everything from the team members' rocky pasts, to several individuals' untimely deaths (at the hands of killer jellyfish, etc., etc.).  Oh, and it probably doesn't help that Dustin Hoffman isn't a convincing screamer...when you find yourself giggling as the main character screams in terror, you know something's gone wrong. 

Unfortunately, Sphere never quite pulls out of this underwater hole that it digs for itself.  With one of the most bland and unsatisfying endings imaginable, and with so many loose ends left unresolved, Sphere leaves you asking the same question an unknown character asks near the end of the film: "What the heck was that?"  Oh, the promise of what could have been...Contact impressed us with ideas and The Abyss drew us in with spectacle.  Sphere tries to do both, but in attempting to do so fails to do either one. 

Responses from cyberspace--thanks for writing!

David Rogers gives this movie  stars: "Until I saw the movie I didn't know what the title meant!" (5/6/00)

eapoe@cistron.nl gives this movie  stars: "Just a movie you can play witt your mind. What's behind it? Make your own thinking... great movie" (10/29/98)

peturb@islandia.is gives this movie  stars: "Pretty good for a Barry Levinson film." (6/14/98)