SEAN CONNERY W/ MARTIN LANDAU & NATALIE WOOD IN METEOR

year: 1979

Sean Connery’s character is so over solving possible catastrophic problems, like how to destroy a METEOR with an outer space vessel that winds up, thanks or actually no thanks to the American government, aiming the missiles at Russia… and vice versa on their secretive end… that he’s gone sailing, literally, and is brought back to backroom meetings with nice guy Karl Malden, cranky Martin Landau, a terrific fellow in Russian leader Brian Keith and ingenue Natalie Wood, whose purpose is to translate for Keith while subtly batting her giant eyes at Connery, the one person who can possibly figure out how to save the planet, with a little help and, added to this somewhat urgent yet not entirely suspenseful plot we get dated glimpses into the meteor soaring and roaring through space, towards Earth, making the original STAR TREK effects seem like 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY… And to perk things up, smaller craters land on random continents, injecting disaster genre elements, from fires to floods, into an otherwise talky thriller. Sure the concept is dated… concerning the Russians… but “modern” blockbusters like ARMAGEDDON and DEEP IMPACT should give thanks to this literally groundbreaking vehicle.

This Sailboat in Outer Space is a long dissolve from the heavens to the earth's sea where our hero's in a race