Customer Reviews

Solar Attack

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I have always loved the actors in this movie and was NOT disappointed in the movie stars. The story line was just "okay" and I enjoyed watching it, but it will probably NOT be one of thos movies that I especially watch again and again. I am a REAL disaster or castrophe buff. Hit was okay but definately not great.

The real problem is not sets, special effects or acting:
it is the plot science is just bad to really nonexistent!
These two points are just both false:
1) solar flares of coherent plasma
2) methane enough to combine with all the atmospheric oxygen
Other than that the submarine warfare was pretty good.
Blowing up the polar ice caps with nuclear missiles is
just a really bad idea, too.
It came real close to being a comedy
and would have been if the acting would have been worse than it was.
It isn't in the class of "Attack of the Killer Tomatoes",
but just barely!

I may not be the biggest fan of disaster films, but this movie was even worse than most. The acting is very weak, and the story line is just too weak. I would have turned the movie off, if my husband wasn't one who watches any movie once. I laughed my way through most of it, and finally gave up to read a book. Though the story idea may be a good one and the actors chosen have done great work, this movie was a major let down. The time would be better spent reading. I hope the book was better.

Watching a string of Sci Fi's movies have basically shown me a pattern. 1. No matter what the disaster, a well placed nuclear strike "just might work" to avert it. 2. The President is always a black guy. 3. No one initially will listen to the Doc Brown scientist. 4. Everything will be fine by the time the credits roll.

The plot in this one was pretty much copied later by "Polar Storm"

Overall, if you like these types of movies, it could have been worse, and Lou Gosset Jr is the man no matter how cheap the movie is!

As a long time Sci-Fi fan, I found this film enjoyable, but derivitive. The special effects were good, but not spectacular. The acting was better than I first expected. The story plot itself seems to be largely derived from Irwin Allen's original 1960 movie version of "Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea", which is the better film in my opinion.

Life on earth is threatened by the effects of huge solar explosions known as coronal mass ejections (CME's), in Solar Attack (2005), a direct to video production from Lions Gate, with a storyline that falls into a very familiar pattern.

Scientist and businessman Lucas Foster (Mark Dacascos) is involved in the study of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. When his space shuttlelike vehicle burns up in the upper atmosphere, while on a mission to measure methane levels, Foster becomes convinced that the planet faces impending disaster. The CME's are penetrating the weakened ozone layer, and igniting methane in the upper atmosphere. These fires in the sky, threaten to burn up all the oxygen on the planet, and extinguish all life on Earth.

After more areas of the sky catch on fire, and satellites begin to fall out of orbit and crash land, Foster presents his theory of impending destruction to the President (Louis Gossett Jr.). As the situation worsens, communication becomes spotty, and more areas of the globe are destroyed. Foster's proposed solution of detonating nuclear missiles at the North Pole, launched from a submarine, may be familiar to anyone that remembers the movie Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea (1961). While the US and Soviet governments dance around, time is running out, leaving Foster little option but to act on his own, to try and save the world.

Fortuitously, the commander of a Soviet submarine near the north pole, is Foster's personal friend, and he manages to get aboard, and convince his Russian comrade to fire his missiles. After a ton of submarine related clichés, the missiles are finally launched, and the planet is spared.

Filled with clichés and elements that have been used before, Solar Attack isn't horrible, it's just unoriginal, predictable, and not terribly interesting or suspenseful, with production values similar to a Sy Fy production. The special effects are not overdone, and are rather pedestrian. Mark Dacascos and most of the cast do what they can with the material, but it's hard to take this film seriously. If you are interested, you may want to tune in if you happen to see it on the Sy Fy schedule.

A threat from the sun will soon burn up the atmosphere and destroy all oxygen on earth. Only Lucas Foster (Mark Dacascos) can predict and through the buddy system have a chance to save the earth despite shortsighted scientists, indecisive politicians and an estranged scientist wife. We may even have to deal with the commies.

Can Lucas overcome all odds in the time restricted disaster? Or all we all doomed?

Yes we have had volcanoes in L.A., moons exploding and all kinds of natural/unnatural disasters. Only renegade and misunderstood scientists can save us from or follies. This won't be the last disaster movie; however it is up there with the best.

I have to take exception to the comments of anyone who says this movie could only appeal to truly stupid and uneducated viewers because I enjoyed the heck out of this movie, and I am the exact opposite of stupid and uneducated. Some pompous windbags apparently think any science fiction movie, particularly one of the global disaster variety, should be written by scientists to ensure that every single detail of the story is consistent with current scientific theories (ignoring the fact that no two scientists are ever going to agree on everything and will likely radically change those theories over time). I for one don't mind having some actual fiction in my science fiction, as long as the story holds together on its own merits. Even Carl Sagan's science fiction novel Contact goes far off the hard science reservation at the end. Are the events found in this movie scientifically sound and believable? No, but who the heck cares? It's a great story that makes for one surprisingly exciting science fiction and geopolitical thrill ride. Solar Attack (also known as Solar Strike) might even warm the cockles of Al Gore's fear mongering heart. Global warming? I've got your global warming right here, fellow.

As the title might suggest, the sun is mad as hell about something and isn't going to take it anymore. The release of CMEs (coronal mass ejections) is nothing new, but all of a sudden our life-giving star is belching out, one right after the other, the veritable mothers of all CMEs. The first sign of trouble comes when the solar probe designed to help watch for these things is incinerated in a heartbeat. Then the privately-financed space plane launched by Lucas Foster (Mark Dacascos) is suddenly lost before it can begin its mission of measuring the levels of methane in the upper atmosphere. Foster's global warming theories about methane gas buildup in the atmosphere led to his dismissal from the Solar and Near Earth Laboratory, but it looks like he may just get the last laugh now - although he may not have long to enjoy it. Once he gets a look at the data coming in from the unprecedented solar storm - and learns from his former partner Joanna Parks (Joanne Kelly) that Earth's orbit will bring it right into the path of the oncoming CMEs - he predicts that the CMEs will penetrate the atmosphere through the holes in the ozone and ignite the unprecedented amount of methane in Earth's atmosphere. If he's right, Earth is looking at a truly extinction level event. The sky will literally catch on fire and burn around the globe, quickly sucking all of the oxygen from Earth's atmosphere and killing every living thing on the planet.

Earth's only hope for survival rests on this renegade scientist's shoulders. Not only must Lucas find a way to divert disaster, he must also convince his exceedingly skeptical former boss and the president of the United States (Louis Gossett, Jr.) to believe what he is saying - and time is very much of the essence. Complicating the problem, especially when communications satellites start falling out of the sky, is the tense relationship between the US and Russia. With Russian nuclear submarines taking part in war games in the North Atlantic - under the watchful eye of their American underwater counterparts - the timing could not be worse for a complete loss of communication.

Obviously, a majority of reviewers hold this Sci-fi network original film in some measure of disdain, so I can't promise you that you'll enjoy it as much as I did. It doesn't have a big budget or feature any well-known actors (apart from an admittedly underused Lou Gossett, Jr.), but I think the movie acquits itself quite well. I actually think Mark Dacascos is a decent actor, and I think the storyline plays quite well as long as you suspend your disbelief and reject any urges to overanalyze the underlying science. It's just a movie, and I say give it a chance - you might just enjoy it.

I'm a big fan of Science Fiction and own over 400 titles. I always thought that world disaster was a poor premise for a science fiction move. This movie is a great example of why. The acting was marginal, the plot was not even that and there is little basis in scientific fact. Probably better not to waste your time.

I read the reviews on this before purchasing,some did'nt favor it but I think that was a rash decision.because this really is a good movie,I enjoyed it a lot.