hen a meteorite crashes into the desert outside Glen Canyon, Ariz., biology professor Ira Kane (Duchovny) and his geology prof colleague Harry Block (Jones) investigate. What they find is mystifying: a rock oozing some kind of blue fluid. They take a sample back to the lab, where Kane makes a startling discovery. It's alive.
Kane--whose personal disgrace has led him to his current community-college job--and Block--who aspires to greater things himself--see the discovery as a way out of their dead-end lives. But they don't count on the swift intervention of the military, led by Kane's one-time nemesis, Gen. Woodman (Ted Levine), and Centers for Disease Control scientist Dr. Allison Reed (Moore).
Kane and Reed share a spark, but Woodman wants to shut Kane and Block out of the investigation entirely and rob them of their chance to claim the discovery for themselves.
Would-be firefighter Wayne Green (Scott), meanwhile, has failed in his most recent attempt to pass the department exam. In his job as a country-club pool manager, he begins to encounter strange creatures crawling up from the ground. When one attacks a club member, Green takes the evidence to Kane and Block for study.
The conclusion is alarming. The life forms from the meteorite are evolving at a frightful pace. Left unchecked, they threaten to take over the world. Woodman won't hear their concerns. But Kane appeals to Reed for help, and she reluctantly agrees to join them to fight the alien threat.
The devolution of Ivan Reitman
Ghostbusters director Reitman has enlisted X-Files heartthrob Duchovny, Oscar nominee Moore and rising film comic Jones in this effort to recapture the laughs and thrills of his past glory days. Alas, the result is a breathtakingly unfunny SF comedy that relies for its chuckles on monkey-brained bathroom jokes and PG-rated innuendo that compare poorly to the evolved smarminess of Ghostbusters.
It may be surprising to hear that the film was originally conceived as a serious SF thriller. But Reitman chose to transform it into a comedy, and the resulting amalgam of SF and locker-room humor doesn't quite gel. The SF elements of the movie, particularly the production design and visual effects, are impressive, as might be expected in these days of anything-goes computer-generated images.
But the humor is strictly junior-high level. There's a lot of smirking about women taking off their shirts and enough fart jokes (including a big visual one) to keep a caveful of Neanderthals in stitches. It's the kind of movie in which the pompous authority figures get their comeuppance and couples sneak off for a little hanky-panky in a car.
It's particularly embarrassing to see an actor like Moore saying a line like "I would have rocked your world." It's also embarrassing to see Duchovny bare his, um, assets in a lame-brained stunt.
As for Duchovny, whatever appeal he may have on the small screen, his dry wit and understated manner are a bad fit for such broad humor, and he is overshadowed by Jones' physical comedy and amped-up zaniness. Jones provides most of the best laughs in the film and gets more from a deadpan stare than Duchovny gets with a page of dialogue.
