Movie review: Galaxy Quest

Galaxy Quest - a movie where human actors were asked to help save an alien planet because the aliens thought that the characters they played and the space adventures they had on their TV series (Galaxy Quest) were real. This is also my blast from the past movie this week..

The movie was shown in 1999 and was obviously a parody of space shows, Star Trek being the one that comes to mind.. I think it was also a good play casting Sigourney Weaver as Lt. Tawny Madison (more on this later).

Never give up, never surrender. - Jason Nesmith, Commander of NSEA Protector

Yeah, that was quote from the movie (or the tv show in the movie, to be precise) spoken by Tim Allen. His line "To infinity and beyond!' from Toy Story got it beat, but I think it's still a solid one. Do you think Tim Allen got bit by space fever? Toy Story in '95 & Toy Story 2 in '99? LOL!




My thoughts:

a) The movie is funny. I'm not a Trekkie but I do understand how to love a TV show or book so much and be very passionate about it.. So I really laughed so hard when the 'nerds' actually knew more about the "ship" than the actors because they  studied and understood the science of it.. Justin Long's character, Brandon, along with his own crew (complete with costumes at the show's convention) was such a lovely tribute to us nerds who'd go through lengths to support a show we love so much..

I found this in Wikipedia where Patrick Stewart expressed my thoughts exactly:

I had originally not wanted to see Galaxy Quest because I heard that it was making fun of Star Trek, and then Jonathan Frakes rang me up and said "You must not miss this movie! See it on a Saturday night in a full theatre." And I did, and of course I found it was brilliant. Brilliant. No one laughed louder or longer in the cinema than I did, but the idea that the ship was saved and all of our heroes in that movie were saved simply by the fact that there were fans who did understand the scientific principles on which the ship worked was absolutely wonderful. And it was both funny and also touching in that it paid tribute to the dedication of these fans. — Patrick Stewart

b) How funny was the contrast to Sigourney's character in Alien to her character in this movie? Female action hero vs a lady whose job it was to "communicate" with the ship's computer, essentially just repeating what the computer says? I think Gwen is brave in her own way, but Ripley would have beat up the enemy alien on her own in less time it took for the good aliens to bring the entire TV cast to space.. If only they saw that 'historical document' instead.. haha..

Gwen: Computer, is there a replacement beryllium sphere on board? 
Computer: Negative, there is no replacement beryllium sphere on board.
Gwen: [to crew] No, there is no replacement beryllium sphere on board.
Tommy: You know, that is really getting annoying!
Gwen: [shouts] Look! I have one job on this lousy ship, it's stupid, but I'm gonna do it! Okay?
Tommy: Sure, no problem.

Oh gosh, how that cracked me up..

c) Practically everyone on the movie is funny but for me it was Sam Roswell and his portrayal of Guy that just cracks me up everytime he's on a scene.. He played the character who was so convinced he'd be the first to bite the bullet because he had a minor role in the TV show and was killed off, even pointing out that because of this, his character didn't deserve to have a last name so he was just called 'Guy', LOL!.  The irony was not lost, of course, when on the scene where Sarris pretended to be Fred, he was the only one left standing..

All in all, a very good movie.. If you haven't seen it, please do so.. Til then!..