Millennium

Name: Millennium
Genre: Sci-Fi, Drama, Thriller
Released: August 25, 1989
Duration: 108 min
Rating: 26
Cast: Al Waxman, Brent Carver, Cheryl Ladd, Daniel J. Travanti, David McIlwraith

1989

METASCORE

Generally unfavorable reviews based on 11 Critic Reviews

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Millennium: A Project Bigger Than You Can Imagine

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Movie Details & Credits

Twentieth Century Fox | Release Date: August 25, 1989 | PG-13

Starring: Al Waxman, Brent Carver, Cheryl Ladd, Daniel J. Travanti, David McIlwraith, Kris Kristofferson, Lawrence Dane, Lloyd Bochner, Maury Chaykin, Robert Joy

Summary: An NTSB investigator seeking the cause of an airline disaster meets a warrior woman from 1000 years in the future. She replaces the people from airplanes before they crash with corpses with the same features.

Director: Michael Anderson

Genre(s): Sci-Fi, Drama, Thriller

Rating: PG-13

Runtime: 108 min

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Metascore

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Critic Reviews

Bentley Boyd

Millennium is a throwback to 1950s, B-grade science fiction movies in which the love story and the concepts had to cover for special effects that weren't too special. [30 Aug 1989, p.3C]

Juan Carlos Coto

The movie continually threatens to become shlock, but the story and serviceable performances hold it together. Still, the three big-name actors don't realize Millennium is a cut above the usual sci-fi flick, and never surprise us with their performances. [29 Aug 1989, p.C5]

The Guardian Derek Malcolm

The vague ending may be a bit of a cheat; but with its sly asides and unembarrassed absurdities, this Outer Limits-style yarn, directed in suitably plain fashion by the veteran Michael Anderson, manages to be more self-convinced, and more diverting, than a mega-buck offering like The Abyss. [19 Oct 1989]

John Hartl

The script earns a few points for trying to deal with the puzzles inherent in time-travel stories, and it's not surprising that the author is John Varley, who has won both the Hugo and Nebula awards for his science-fiction novels. But he needed a more inspired director than the plodding Michael Anderson. [15 Mar 1990, p.D5]

Staff (Not Credited)

Millennium tries hard to combine sci-fi special effects and a love story, but unfortunately neither are convincing and the pic ends up looking like a failed pilot for a TV series. Veteran science-fiction director Michael Anderson does the best he can with a mediocre script. Read full review

Tim Appelo

It offers neither the tension of a good plane-disaster movie nor the ingenuity of a smart time-travel tale. Read full review

Kevin Thomas

Millennium has little to distract you from the obvious phony hair coloring of its stars. Read full review

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User Reviews

tonyGreen

Sep 21, 2021

This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. The Good: A really cool concept (spoilers below), and the exposition is not overdone. The plot and pacing actually mostly works. The dialogue works for the most part, despite shoving in a few cliches and cheesy groaners. Kristofferson gives a great laconic performance in the leading male role. He was about 53 at the time the film was made, but looks more like he's 65, which may or may not a good thing. Certainly his character is quite a bit older than Cheryl Ladd, his romantic counterpart. Daniel J. Travanti as the somewhat creepy and enigmatic professor is also really great. The film has a very old Hollywood sensibility. The romantic plot is not superfluous sub-plot; it is central to the main plot. It's refreshing to see a couple of older actors as the romantic leads. It is unapolagetically a B-movie / extended Twilight Zone episode, and never really pretends otherwise.

The first 30 minutes or so promise to turn into a real hidden gem of a film until the budgetary constraints let it down...

The Bad:

Suffers from the curse of Sci-Fi being both expensive to make and a gamble financially. The Video effects are actually pretty good, the practical effects and prosthetics, costume etc. less so. They try to do too much with too little budget.

There is not a lot of chemistry between the leads, and the basis for the relationship isn't really explained beyond a satisfying sexual encounter. Which really isn't conveyed with any real eroticism either.

SHOULD YOU WATCH IT?

Yes, overall. It's different and fun, and doesn't take itself too seriously. And with a better budget and perhaps without the romantic elements could have been a really great Time Travel / Sci-Fi flick.

*************** SPOILERS FOLLOW ***************************

I really like that there are no actual villains in the whole movie - scary looking characters for sure, but the real antagonist is just the situation.

A dying humanity in the year circa 3000 AD are infertile and dying, and must "abduct" healthy humans from the past using a time portal. To avoid the old time travel paradox - The "Grandfather Paradox" they abduct people on airliners from the 20th century moments before a catastrophic air crash. They were going to die anyway, and by using *technology* the operatives / "air hostesses" replace the passengers with exact (non living) replica bodies. And the saved / abducted passengers have another chance at life, albeit in a pretty **** future world.

As for the ambiguous ending, which I liked, my interpretation is that the viable humans restart in a separate timeline. Or perhaps they are projected eons into the future, into a world that has healed itself from humanity's excesses and is fit for life again.… Expand

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