An astonishingly awful “action” thriller with a science fiction twist markedly devoid of anything even remotely resembling action. The listless direction by Rodney McDonald and comatose performances are bad enough, but the real let-down is the dire script – full of clunky dialogue, half-baked ideas and ill-conceived plotting, it kills the film stone dead within the first 20 minutes. Nothing is ever going to save it after the deadly dull opening reel.
US and Russian scientists are preparing a mission to a space station which is jeopardised when Tadjikistani rebels, led by Captain Previ Federov (Frank Zagarino), seize control of the to station. Nuclear weapons have been smuggled aboard to blackmail the US into agreeing to side with the Tadzikistan’s against Russia or have its major cities obliterated. Enter test pilot/astronaut J.J. Hendricks (Daniel Baldwin) as one of those reckless, rule-breaking, tough-talking “heroes” that only exist in the minds of imagination-strapped low-budget scriptwriters to save the day…
Given what little they have to work with it’s a miracle that the cast even bothers – they do seem to be trying to salvage some dignity from this but fail badly. Daniel Baldwin here has all the charisma, charm and warmth of a Gerry Anderson puppet, lumbering through his scenes with an unconvincing machismo that is at first laughable but ultimately becomes rather wearing. Teri Ann Linn is the least convincing NASA scientist you’ll ever see and Frank Zagarino gets to try out a variety of vaguely East European accentswithout ever really settling on one that he likes. And don’t even get me started on those oh-so-tough Marines and their hysterically bad tough guy dialogue…
It’s amazing that anyone found anything of any merit in Chris Bremble’s script, a piece of work so shoddy that it beggars belief. The sub-Die Hard terrorist plot is hackneyed and Bremble does absolutely nothing to bring anything new to the idea (setting it in space isn’t enough); his dialogue is jaw-dropping in it’s awfulness (“Christ people, find a government phone book and get me the phone number for NORAD!”); and his attempts at characterization are woeful. And the climax to this sorry tale is so obvious that most genre-savvy viewers will have guessed it as soon as the Russian treachery is revealed.
Flat, uninvolving yet not quite bad enough to be fun, Fallout is just another uninspired, under-budgeted no-hoper, the sort that turns up for a while on low-rent DVD and late-night cable TV before finally disappearing into the ether for eternity. If that’s the fate awaiting Fallout, no-one will be sorry to see it go.
The EOFFTV Review 