Moviegoers travel to Mars – again – in ‘Red Planet’

In theaters

RED PLANET. Directed by Antony Hoffman. Written by Chuck Pfarrer and Jonathan Lemkin. 116 minutes. PG-13.

In 1924, director Yakov Protazanov filmed “Aelita: Queen of Mars,” a silent Soviet propaganda film that drew comparisons between Russia and what Protazanov perceived as the capitalist planet Mars. It featured an engineer who kills his wife (a refugee care worker), takes off for the Red Planet in his homemade spaceship, and falls in love with his dream girl, Aelita, queen of Mars.

For its time, the film was a hugely hyped, big-budget spectacle; one that not only influenced Fritz Lang’s 1926 film “Metropolis,” but which directly influenced Hollywood’s fascination with the Red Planet.

It may not be fair to suggest that the groundbreaking “Aelita” is responsible for such camp debacles as “Santa Claus Conquers the Martians,” “Lobsterman from Mars,” “Devil Girl from Mars” and “Planet Blood,” but it can be said that the film sparked pop culture’s fascination with seeing Mars on film, thus paving the way for those lesser films to land in theaters.

Antony Hoffman’s “Red Planet” is a continuation of that effort. The film, which is Hollywood’s second attempt this year at finding intelligent life on the fourth rock from the sun (Brian De Palma launched his syrupy, ill-fated “Mission to Mars” in February), surprises in that it does find a measure of intelligence.

The film stars Val Kilmer, Carrie-Ann Moss, Tom Sizemore, Benjamin Bratt, Simon Baker and Terrence Stamp as astronauts sent to Mars to study the growth of algae planted earlier to create a breathable atmosphere. But when a solar flare damages the crew’s ship, all hell – predictably – breaks loose: Part of the crew finds themselves stranded on Mars while another, Bowman (Moss), is stuck aboard the failing mother ship.

As rote as this sounds, “Red Planet,” which is being marketed as a sci-fi thriller when it’s actually an ecological drama about the ramifications of Earth’s ruined atmosphere in the year 2025, nevertheless manages to drum up some dramatic interest. It does a fair job in fleshing out its characters before throwing them into turmoil; its production values are first-rate; and there are a handful of moments that genuinely thrill.

Still, the film is mostly too introspective, too drawn-out, too leaden to suit. There was a time in film, such as in “Aelita: Queen of Mars,” when a trip to Mars was as impossible to conceive as it was exciting to imagine. Now, with Mars well within our grasp, we’ve come to a point when the trip itself seems almost like a ho-hum breeze.

Maybe it’s time for Hollywood to return to other planets – say Saturn, Pluto or Neptune – and discover what cinematic life can be found out there.

Grade: C+

TIME REGAINED. Directed by Raul Ruiz. Written by Gilles Taurand and Ruiz. 162 minutes. Rated R. Now playing, Railroad Square Cinema, Waterville.

There are probably more challenging undertakings one could assume than mounting a three-hour production of Marcel Proust’s “Time Regained,” the sixth and final volume in his beast of a novel, “Remembrance of Things Past.”

For instance, electing a new president comes to mind.

However, from a literary perspective, it’s difficult to imagine many novels as unsuitable for the screen as this, a work whose construction is so circular in nature – and whose themes, characters and ideas exist so firmly within the realm of a deeply personal internal landscape – the idea of bringing it to screen seems downright absurd.

It’s almost a shock, then, to see how well Chilean director Raul Ruiz has done in capturing the essence of “Time Regained”; just as in Proust’s work, Ruiz’s film is rich in texture, sumptuous in its images, beautifully surreal.

The film, which begins in 1922 with Proust (Marcello Mazzarella) on his deathbed, stars Catherine Deneuve as Odette de Crecy, Emmanuelle Beart as Gilberte, Vincent Perez as Morel and John Malkovich, of all people, as Charlus. It isn’t for anyone with a passing knowledge of the French novelist’s work; indeed, those who haven’t studied Proust will likely be lost in his allegorical search for truth.

But those aficionados of Proust will revel in how Ruiz plays with memory to intertwine the real characters in Proust’s life – those ridiculous, chattering, early 20th century class archetypes he found at swanky salons – with the fictional characters that spark his novel.

There’s no story told in “Time Regained”; just images and moments inspired by the book and Proust’s life. For some, that will prove maddening. For others, those who want to be challenged by the ambitious undertaking of an ambitious work, it’ll be sublime.

Grade: B+

Christopher Smith is the Bangor Daily News film critic. His reviews appear Mondays in Style, Thursdays in the scene, and Thursdays on “NEWS CENTER at 5:30 p.m.” on WLBZ 2 and WCSH 6.