Space Cowboys (2000)

Directed by Clint Eastwood. Starring Clint Eastwood, Tommy Lee Jones, James Garner, Donald Sutherland, James Cromwell, Marcia Gay Harden, William Devane, Courtney B. Vance, Loren Dean, Rade Šerbedžija, Barbara Babcock, Blair Brown. [PG-13]

When a satellite threatens to crash to Earth, NASA reluctantly calls upon the ex-test pilot (Eastwood) who designed its now-obsolete electronics to prevent that from happening; however, he has a stipulation: he’ll only help if he can take along his entire former team of now-sixty-somethings to facilitate the repairs in space. Contrived star ensemble vehicle is scarcely credible from the get-go—its geriatrics-in-space gimmick doesn’t even crack the top five—and not even director Eastwood’s customarily smooth and congenial approach can cover it up. Only someone grouchy enough to make Clint look like Fred Rogers won’t enjoy seeing the feisty old-timers doing their thing, but that and a few decent hardware-in-action sequences are about all there is to enjoy. Brace yourself for a clumsily-telegraphed late-game “surprise,” which serves little purpose other than to contrive a crisis and clarify any doubt over who’s “good” and who’s “bad.” Using Eastwood, Jones and Cromwell’s voices to dub their much-younger characters in the 1950s prologue is a considerable distraction. Look for Jon Hamm as a pilot at an airfield.

54/100