Scientific mumbo jumbo is what BLACK HOLE is all about, not that this is much of a surprise since most Sci-Fi Channel original movies have some degree of scientific mumbo jumbo in them. When you consider the Sci-Fi Channel's love for giving their original movies two part titles with semicolons I'm surprised they didn't just go ahead and retitle this BLACK HOLE: SCIENTIFIC MUMBO JUMBO TERROR.

Certain aspects of BLACK HOLE also reminded me a lot of a 1991 made-for-CBS sci-fi monster movie called NOT OF THIS WORLD that dealt with trying to stop an alien energy creature that wants to feed on a nuclear power plant. That is not a film I ever wanted to be reminded of again.

Now the idea of a black hole accidentally being created on Earth could make for a decent film. Surely some science fiction writer out there has already written a book about such a concept and done a better job than this. The monster aspect of BLACK HOLE feels like something that was shoehorned in at the request of Sci-Fi Channel producers who felt the black hole alone just wasn't enough. Or perhaps it's because it's cheaper to computer animate an energy creature that looks like a cross between a camouflaged Predator and Video Man from the old "Spider-Man & His Amazing Friends" cartoon than it is to create the CGI visuals needed to show an enormous black hole engulfing a major metropolitan area. That would also probably explain why the few F/X heavy scenes of black hole devastation are vastly superior to the energy being's plasma ball effects.

And it just wouldn't be a modern disaster movie if someone didn't solve the problem by nuking something. Or hero keeps telling them that it won't have any effect at all but the military brass just won't listen. God gave mankind nuclear weapons to both destroy and heal the world and who are they to defy God? You'd like to think that even a scientific dullard would realize that trying to destroy a black hole or super condensed energy in this manner makes about as much sense trying to stop an F5 tornado by nuking it. Government and military officials are shown being so wrongheaded in their gung ho determination to use nuclear weapons on what amounts to a giant energy vortex that I bet if the menace were a Category 5 hurricane threatening the US coastline they'd think they could blow it back out to sea with a giant wind machine. We are talking about the same government officials that initially order the media to call for an immediate evacuation of major US city without bothering to give any explanation as to why they're calling for the evacuation other than to inform the public that it is not in relation to terrorism.

I will give BLACK HOLE this much; I've never seen a disaster movie set in St. Louis, Missouri. That's about the only original thing found here.



Judd Nelson, looking like Mancow post-electrocution, is fuzzy science boy. I call him that not only because of the fuzzy science he preaches, but one look at his unkempt hair and the word "fuzzy" immediately comes to mind. He seems to have patterned his performance after Anthony Geary's "Philo" from UHF only without all that character’s entertaining weirdness.

He’s joined by a less fuzzy science girl played by Kristy Swanson, here doing her best Kellie Martin impression in hopes viewers will get confused and not attribute this turkey to her already unimpressive resume. Having come in first place on Fox's "Quantum Physics with the Stars", here she plays second fiddle to Nelson, a role that requires little of her outside of just taking up space, occasionally spouting some scientific jargon, and get kissy face with him.

The film also keeps bringing up fuzzy science boy's estranged ex-wife and teen daughter, both of whom are put in harm's way merely by being in the vicinity of the disaster zone but never enough to justify why the film felt the need to include them at all. Then again, it's implied that fuzzy science boy is an alcoholic and a personal train wreck, but none of that is ever built up and how hard off can he be if science girl can still find time to playing tonsil hockey with him amid a potential apocalypse.

In the end we're left with two bland leads displaying no charisma whatsoever, a monster devoid of any genuine sense of menace, assorted generic protagonists and antagonists without an ounce of common sense, a real lack of humor, intentional or otherwise, and a whole lot of empty special effects. In spite of the fantastical nature of its plot, BLACK HOLE is perfunctory even by Sci-Fi Channel standards. It isn't a particularly bad movie so much as it is one that's DOA. Stuff happens and dialogue is spoken but nothing amounts to anything.

BLACK HOLE was directed by Tibor Tackas who also did one of my all-time favorite Sci-Fi Channel original movies, MANSQUITO. He's also the same guy that did EARTHQUAKE: NATURE UNLEASHED, another Sci-Fi Channel disaster movie that bored me to such a degree I turned it off after 20 minutes. BLACK HOLE owes more to the latter than the former. It isn't good enough to be taken seriously and lacks the cheese factor that makes a 10.5: APOCALYPSE enjoyable. This flick is so flat you could play air hockey on it.

It’s fitting that the Sci-Fi Channel chose to premiere BLACK HOLE preceded by three other disaster movie snoozefests in regular rotation on the network: MAXIMUM VELOCITY, PATH OF DESTRUCTION, and EARTHQUAKE: NATURE UNLEASHED. Talk about a black hole of dullness from which no entertainment value can escape.