Average Rating: 6.4/10
Reviews Counted: 38
Fresh: 28 | Rotten: 10
Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Movie may be thin and uneven, but it's hilarious in enough of the right spots to do the show's big-screen transition justice.
Average Rating: 6.4/10
Critic Reviews: 14
Fresh: 10 | Rotten: 4
Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Movie may be thin and uneven, but it's hilarious in enough of the right spots to do the show's big-screen transition justice.
liked it
Average Rating: 3.7/5
User Ratings: 25,808
The cult television series Mystery Science Theatre 3000 transfers its brand of science-fiction wisecracking to the big screen with relatively few changes. The concept is the same in series and film: an innocent man (Michael J. Nelson, playing Mike Nelson) is stranded in outer space by a mad scientist, who subjects the poor slob to "experiments" that involve watching the worst movies ever made. In order to survive this cinematic torture, Mike and his two companions, sarcastic robots Tom Servo and
PG-13, 1 hr. 15 min.
Science Fiction & Fantasy, Comedy
Michael J. Nelson, Trace Beaulieu, Jim Mallon, Kevin Murphy, Mary Jo Pehl
Apr 19, 1996 Wide
Oct 10, 2000
MCA Universal Home Video
All Critics (38) | Top Critics (14) | Fresh (29) | Rotten (11) | DVD (19)
[The wisecracks], more often than not, don't go over. But those that do still add up to lotsa laughs, and the sheer weight of them eventually builds an atmosphere of mild lunacy that it's useless to resist.
So, how does movie differ from TV show? The answer is, thankfully, not a lot.
Helping to make these pleasantries funny is their spur-of-the-moment quality, the same quick spontaneity that characterizes chance remarks overheard at raucous movie houses. Capturing that bright and unexpected quality is what the MST3K crew does best.
One of the film's more likable aspects is its certainty that nothing's sacred.
Part of the appeal of the program is in the wisecracking. But the movies themselves are also crucial.
I guess there are some concepts that don't excel in the translation from the small screen to the big one.
The TV show might be funnier but this is pretty solid introduction to the MST3K phenomenon.
With added scope but little to justify its bloated heft, Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Movie is the show's own Manos: The Hands of Fate.
In the theater, whenever Mike, Crow or Tom Servo flub a punchline or resort to a fart joke, you almost want to lean forward and shush them.
The translation is a little bumpy, but this is Mystery Science Theater we're talking about here: even a less concentrated effort is guaranteed to be a pants-wetting night of endless laughs and infectious bad movie grimacing.
As we were saying to Andy Rooney the other day, don't you just hate it when you go to see some old movie and find the front two rows filled with college students who think they're extremely clever and don't care who knows it?
Anything Mystery Science puts a smile on my face!
Sophomoric laughs, sure, but funny.
A bad idea for a TV show becomes a worse idea for a movie.
My guess is this highly specific art form will not survive this trip from late-night TV to the big screen. Still, fans of this genre should get plenty of what they came for.
Great fun from Mike and the Bots, who can make almost any awful movie worth sitting through.
From the cult TV series, a man and his two robots trapped in space mock one of the worst movies ever made--only in the one-off feature version the film is THIS ISLAND EARTH, a colorful sci-fi film that isn't close to the laughable fare the show usually covered. The feature film offers very few extras for fans, won't
December 28, 2007
Super Reviewer
I love Mystery Science Theater, but the movie version does not compare well with the television series. This Island Earth just doesn't offer many opportunities for humor (except for the absurd insect mutants that are supposedly similar to the insects here on earth). I can't imagine even the most hardcore MST3K fans
December 15, 2008Super Reviewer
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