Meteor (1979) – Director: Ronald Neame – 3/10 (very mediocre/bad).
It would be unrealistic to expect some unbridled novelty or creativity from a movie of this sort, nevertheless, there is no sidestepping the issue of it being badly assembled and rachitic in its final form. The primary problem seems to consist in its extremely bland characterization in that the main hero almost feels superfluously interjected into the storyline which turns out just as despoiled of the human element as the central character is. Certain vestiges of the disaster pic formula occasionally come to the fore in that one can sporadically espy some of the themes the subgenre is known for, nevertheless, they all ring hollow here and evidently lack the draw of film’s more accomplished siblings. To add insult to injury, when the focus is put predominantly on special effects and the said special effects tend to be on the nugatory side, it begs the question of what the primary attraction is supposed to be here. Meteor fails to showcase technical prowess of any sort, the storyline proves thoroughly perfunctory and meaningless, the tepid performances come to compound script’s inexcusably one-dimensional nature and on the whole, the motion picture unfolds in a manner which, in a certain sense, is likely to appear offensive and crude to any critically minded viewer. Long story short, there is no good reason to view this, even if you have a bad case of the 1970s nostalgia.
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