Upon
seeing coming attraction trailers for this new sci-fi comedy from Dreamworks,
I thought to myself, Oh no, another dreadful, meaningless comedy to look forward
to this Holiday season! It looked positively awful. To my surprise, Galaxy Quest
was a lot of fun. Although it is essentially a one-joke movie, it contains some
very funny performances (the best coming from Die Hard's Alan Rickman), and some
wonderfully clever moments, along with witty dialogue.
Tim
Allen heads the cast as a well known actor from an old, popular sci-fi television
show. He and his fellow cast members (including Rickman, and Sigourney Weaver)
spend most of their days attending conventions where their crazy fans continuously
drool over them. The action begins when a group of real aliens (assuming the shape
of humans) seek Allen and his crew's help in destroying an enemy. It seems that
these lovable aliens have been watching Allen's famous television show from their
world, only they believe that the contents of the show are real, and have based
much of their technology on what they've seen from Allen and his goofy gang.
Galaxy
Quest is light, and breezy entertainment that sort of reminded me of similar sci-fi
films from the 80's including; Explorers, Last Starfighter, and Ice Pirates. It's
fun watching all the inside jokes, most of which poke fun at Star Trek and the
legions of fans that show has generated. It's also nice to see such heavyweight
actors as Rickman and Weaver having so much fun.
Earlier
this year, there was a fun documentary called Trekkies, in which Denise Crosby
(Star Trek: The Next Generation) traveled around and documented the crazy world
of Star Trek fans. Galaxy Quest, like Trekkies, doesn't really make fun of the
fans, but celebrates their wild energy. In fact, in the entertaining Galaxy Quest,
the fans even get a piece of the action.
If
you're looking for a goofy, fun time at the movies, you could do much worse than
the likable Galaxy Quest. It's one of the most entertaining films of the holiday
season.
