Here's the scoop: it's the near future (2020), and humans are now prepared to explore their nearest planetary neighbor, the red planet. The best astronauts in the world are selected to go in two missions. The first includes Don Cheadle from "Boogie Nights" and some no-name Russians. This mission fails, as it encounters a strange anomaly on the planet's surface. The second mission turns into a rescue mission instead of a routine follow-up, sending out Tim Robbins, his wife (played by Connie Nielsen), Jerry O'Connell (of TV's Sliders), and Gary Sinise. Sinise's character has recently lost his wife to illness after they planned to implement a large part of the Mars mission. Surprise! He gets another chance.

Before I tell you why this movie wasn't as good as it could have been, lets look at what kept me entertained. First, the special effects and the sound effects were amazing. I think my jaw actually hit the floor near the beginning of the film. The way they were used really played on my imagination and got me interested. Gary Sinise, of "Forrest Gump" and "Apollo 13" fame, gives another quality performance here. Those were the high points.

Now the not-so-high points. The trailer of the movie proclaims, "For years we've been searching for the origins of life on earth. We've been looking on the wrong planet," sounds really cool. However, when you give that much of the resolution of the movie away, there isn't a whole lot left to be surprised or impressed with. Next: the acting. I really, really liked Tim Robbins in "The Shawshank Redemption" and Robbins is an impressive dramatic actor, but he is definitely not an impressive action-film actor. To give him some credit, maybe it wasn't entirely his fault. The script writers gave him the cheesy "I'm a smart, important, take-charge, macho astronaut one-liners to recite throughout the film that just made me laugh. The rest of the acting was OK but also suffered from a poor script. The soundtrack was cheesy too, and so were the film's attempts to be patriotic.

Maybe the real problem with the film is that it can't decide if it wants to be an action film or a drama, or even a sci-fi thriller. It might be trying to be "Armageddon," but it doesn't have enough humor, or good writing. It also at times reminded me of "Apollo 13," but it doesn't have the historical interest of that movie.

Overall, the result is a confused, poorly written movie revolving around the basic idea, "What if life on earth didn't start on earth, and the secrets of our universe are kept on Mars? Yeah, that's a good idea, let's make up some characters to figure that out. OK, this will be a great movie." (Note the sarcasm.)

Nice try, but Houston, this movie has too many problems. 2 out of 5.