Night of the Comet

[Andrew]

Reader review by Ethan.  A pair of spunky sisters discover that a rogue comet has turned everybody into either red dust or crazy zombies (that will eventually turn into red dust).

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[Andrew]

I must have a soft spot for this film.  It is certainly bad, and takes some liberty with what will protect a person from the comet's harmful effects.  Samantha survives by sleeping in a metal garden shed, but the scientists were in an underground bunker (they just left the vent open).  Heck, Regina is in an old fallout shelter in a movie theater.  By and large, everybody else on the planet is a red-dust-will-become zombie.

The two lab technicians happily telling stories to the kids as they prepared the children to be turned into involuntary red blood cell donors was funny in a black humor sort of way, as was Mary Woronov's character drifting off to death after giving herself a lethal injection, because her last words were to Hector: "She was right.  You are kinda cute." *SMILE* +DEAD+

And it still cracks me up that, after the end of the world, the only thing left would be red dust and Member's Only jackets.

[Valentine Kutter]

Oh, how can you NOT love this movie ??
One of the greats from the "Plot hole you can drive a truck thru" series.
I recommend this one on a triple bill with Solarbabies and The Stuff...... and plenty of beer and buffalo wings.


VK 

[DavidFullam]

My Brother (who isn't the biggest genre fan) absolutely loves this film. I on the other hand, absolutely hate it.

[InformationGeek]

Alright, I just read this read this review and I still don't get it.  That's obviously a sign of a bad movie when I don't even get the plot.

Also, I like to point out the clothing thing the reviewer mention.  How the heck did the people turn to dust while the clothing remain intact?   This reminds me of another stupid movie, The Drifting Classroom.  In that movie, the people in the film discovered that they were sent into the future hundreds or maybe thousands of years and they realize this when the school's janitor discovers his dog's bones and collar.  Despite the fact that everything else in the world turned to dust and sand, the bones and collar did not... Makes as much sense has the clothes not during into red dust while the rest of the body did.

[Sardu]

With all due respect (and I haven't seen this movie in 20 years but correct me if I'm wrong) the decision to go to the radio station made perfect sense- there was a voice till broadcasting over it.  They thought there was a live human there.  It wasn't until they got there that they found out (and of course the audience is one step ahead) the station was automated.  But that was still the best way to try and contact any other live people.  It seems like a solid plan.  Of course, that doesn't change all the other points you bring up.  Good review!  I may have to watch it again myself now, though maybe I shouldn't spoil my own fond memories of it *g*

[Torgo]

I've always liked this movie plot holes and all. Lots of fun to be had watching this one.

[Rictras Shard]

It is obvious from reading this review that you haven't actually watched the movie. For example, only one of the girls was taken to the military complex. Also, Hector is not the hero of the movie, the main characters are the two sisters, primarily the older one.

Perhaps if you really watch the movie, you might like it.

[Jay the Magnificent]

i think this movie is a great study on post apocalyptic denial and acceptance

[Rev. Powell]

I didn't think this was quite as bad as the reviewer did... not good, be any stretch, but kinda fun in a dumb 80s way.  It has a small cult following, partly because of the female action heroine (I'm sure the reviewer knew that Hector was not the hero, but was just making a clever chauvinistic joke...  )

The one question I'd ask the director or screenwriter, if I could, was: why was Regina shown prostituting herself early in the film?  I have no idea what sleeping with a guy for $15 was supposed to add to her character.

[Nakuyabi]

While I don't agree with the review itself, I do agree with the general rating. Night of the Comet, like a lot of other cheesy flicks, probably survived its poor returns at the box office by getting shopped out to cable and then to regular TV on the graveyard shift. (That's where I remember seeing this movie for the first time back in the early 1990s.)  Certainly the production values are at the made-for-TV level all the way.

Yes, the reviewer did miss a few points that help shrink those plot holes a bit: checking the radio station because it was still broadcasting was generally a pretty good idea, that little gun Hector was carrying might not be much use in a real firefight, but it's certainly good for a punk or two one might happen to meet while traveling, and Samantha didn't find her way to the creepy science guys' vault until very late in the film when Hector brought her there in the trunk of his car. There's at least some plausibility to all the various characters' actions.

The real problem with Night of the Comet, in my opinion, is that its makers couldn't make up their minds what kind of movie it was: zombie sci-fi thriller, or post-apocalyptic rom-com. Looking back on Robert Beltran after having seen his performance as Chakotay in Star Trek: Voyager, a thing I realize is that he's playing the same kind of character he was with Chakotay; a level-headed guy who deals with every problem sensibly in a way that's too understated to fit into an action flick. Mad Max, he ain't. Put him in a soap opera or chick flick, and he'd fit just fine. Put him in a zombie flick, and he has every reason to survive to the end, but he's not going to be hammy enough to be the wasteland warrior such films require for main characters.

Done a certain way, romance and post-apocalyptic stories might combine well, but zombies and romance pretty much don't. This movie would be a lot better if it had dumped either Hector or the zombies. Dump Hector, and you'd have a decent if unremarkable zombie flick (like a zillion others). Dump the zombies, and you'd have a pretty good chick flick that girls could persuade their boyfriends to watch with them. I, for one, would prefer to dump the zombies and just focus on the serious business of repopulation.

Despite what this reviewer Ethan says, I think the characters could make a go of repopulating the world, especially since from what we've seen so far, there are probably more survivors than we saw. Even just three couples (assuming those two children they rescued aren't too closely related) could conceivably repopulate the world in a very short time. There's a fair bit of genetic diversity among the guys, only Reg and Sam are closely related, and assuming no one tries any wife-swapping, everyone in the next generation would feel no compulsion to marry anyone closer than a first cousin. (Despite the eyebrows it raises nowadays, I doubt anyone in the post-apocalyptic culture is going to complain about a few first cousins getting married.) By the time the third generation started having kids, there could be well over a hundred people in their tribe. The world managed to get itself populated the first time with less than that.

I see a lot of loose ends that could have been tied together if the writers had made up their minds, in fact. Audrey's suicide, in view of the weather washing away the noxious dust a day or so later, seems especially pointless. Yes, Regina's sleeping with some coworker for a $15 just so she could spend the evening away from her atrocious mother also strikes me as pretty sleazy, but if the writers had dumped the zombies and focused on repopulation, that could have been used for a bit of a plot point later as well: having Reg realize she's going to have to clean up her act and get monogamous with Hector if she and the rest of the human race are to survive. In fact, having her find out that she's pregnant from that little one-night stand could potentially be a funny way to end the story:

Regina: Uh, Hector? I'm pregnant.
Hector: Already? We've only been trying a month.
Regina: Uh, well... you know, I was already worried I was a little late when we tied the knot. I think this one's about two months along.
Hector: Two months!? Who...? Ah, don't tell me. I don't want to know who he was. I said I wanted to be a father, and I will be. Just... make sure the next one looks like me, got it? And every one after that. We've got to stick together and make this work if we're going to stay alive.
Regina: I got it. I'm sorry I didn't tell you sooner, honey. You know you're the only one for me now...
Hector: I know.
Regina: No, I mean, really, you're the only--
Hector: I know!

[Beefcurtanz]

I like this movie a lot. What's not to love about a post-apocalyptic christmas movie?? They even go to a mall. The ending is fun.