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The Vault: Space Camp

Relatively enjoyable because of the fantasy aspects, SpaceCamp's downfall is the poor execution of the details.

As is standard in children's films, each of the characters is introduced by the archetype they are most immediately identifiable with. This isn't really a bad thing; there are only so many minutes in a movie, and it's often better in a simple film like this just to reference which character a role is and get on with the plot. You don't watch a movie about four nerds accidentally being shot into space by an overly literal robot for the character study.

The acting errs toward the ham-fisted, with the worst performance being turned in by eventually Oscar nominee Jaoquin Pheonix. He was only 12 at the time, so you can give him a break for that. Lea Thompson turns in her usual (at the time) nerdy pretty girl routine, but it was done much better in Back to the Future.

The most entertaining part of the movie was yelling at it about all of the logical inconsistencies in the accidental space flight. Of course, a lot goes wrong while the crew is in space, but most of it didn't make too much sense (wait for the scene when only the kid can reach the oxygen tanks).

So there's nothing fantastic to report about SpaceCamp. It wasn't terrible, but I wouldn't recommend it as a movie to watch because it happens to be on TV when you have nothing better to do. Read a book instead.



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