Riverworld

Product Description

Welcome to the most spectacular afterlife ever, where everyone is reborn young and healthy - including the most vicious and ruthless warriors of all time! This is the wondrously imaginative setting of Riverworld, a mysterious, sultry planet where the past, present and future must battle together for the precious soul of humanity. When a meteor shower above Earth sends astronaut Jeff Hale to Riverworld, he immediately encounters a powerful warlord named Valdemar who thunders in with an army and declares himself master and all newcomers soldiers, workers or slaves. Now it s up to Hale and an unusual band of allies to fight an ancient Roman emperor and a Viking warlord in order to reach Valdemar, gain their freedom and secure a future for all mankind. Starring Kevin Smith (TV s Hercules: The Legendary Journeys and Xena: Warrior Princess ) in his last performance, Riverworld is an extraordinary sci-fi adventure based on the stories of legendary writer Philip Jos Farmer.

System Requirements:

Running Time 90 Min

Format: DVD MOVIE

Customer Reviews:

Good light hearted fun if you can overlook the flaws.......2007-07-02

Since I've not read the books, someone will have to help me with how faithful this is to the books, but in the movie an astronaut dies in a space shuttle crash, and wakes up on a strange new world. Everyone who ever lived is reborn on this new world with all the memories of their previous life, but with a 25 year old body. They are given clothing and food from mysterious canisters.

Nero, the infamous evil emperor of Rome, leads the bad guys as they attempt to take control. Mark Twain leads a group of rebels who construct a River Boat, and want to sail up the river to find out what is the source of this strange river and what is the meaning of this planet.

A little internet research shows that this "movie" was actually supposed to be a television pilot for a Science Fiction channel TV series based on Riverworld which for one reason or another never got green lighted. That explains the low production values, and the fact that most of the questions (like, what is this strange planet and why is everyone there) remain unanswered at the end of the film.

Despite the low production values, and a lot of technical goofs in this film (day suddenly turning to night, etc), I've got to say that I thought it was a lot more interesting than many of the big budget Hollywood block busters I've seen in my time. Despite the ridiculous plot, it is kind of fun to imagine what would happen if all of history's people all of a sudden woke up on the same river at the same time. Maybe its shame this never got made into its own series, but I'll have to pick up the books someday.

For the amateur history buff, there is plenty to nit-pick. Aside from the fact that they were both evil, the Nero in this film could not be more different from his historical inspiration. The Nero in this film is super-macho, fearless, an excellent fighter, is admired by his men, and has dreams of conquest and empire. The historical Nero was a fat mamma's boy who had to rig athletic contests so he could win, who abandoned the running of the empire so he could focus on the arts, and who was a weakling who barely had the strength to perform his own suicide. To the film's credits, it does address some of these incongruities near the end when one of the characters confronts Nero about the historical record, but I thought it was too little too late.

Other minor stuff as well. At one point a former holocaust victim tries to tell an African slave ship victim that he too was enslaved by white men. She has trouble believing that white people would be so wicked as to enslave their own race, but Africans themselves enslaved other Africans during era of slavery. Also the image of Mark Twain in this movie certainly isn't the image I get of him from reading his books, but I guess some of this is open to interpretation.

Also, given that everyone wakes up on this strange planet naked as the day they were born, I have a hard time believing that they could construct all the weapons and buildings they have. The explanation given is that some people have been on River World for as long as 10 years, but I doubt even 10 years would be long enough to mine all the metal and construct all the swords and armor that Nero and the bad guys use, much less the elaborate post-industrial revolution steamboat that Mark Twain and his friends build.

But if you don't question the small stuff too much, it can be an interesting 2 hours.

Fairly Good.......2006-11-12

A fair movie but to give only an idea of the great work of Mr Farmer Epic Saga.

Big Dissapointment - MINUS 3 STARS.......2006-07-04

I absolutely LOVED the Riverworld series. It had everything I want in a novel. I heartily recommend it.
I don't know what this is but it isn't RIVERWORLD. This pale shadow of the same idea is another example of how not to bring a series to the screen. (Remember Dune?) Basically this is the bastardized hollywood version, condensing 3 of the 5 books into 90 minutes.
The main character is now an A-attaboy ASTRONAUT!, who has all the depth of a cracker with parsley. I am so dissapointed. If you have read the books you will be too.

Riverworld By Pam.......2006-07-03

Hi, this was a great story, the only thing I find, is that at the end you are not sure, if there is going to be an END! its left with you not knowing; is there more? and so far I have not found a series 2. I am hoping there will be.

A TV pilot not a movie..........2006-06-13

Being a long time fan of the books I made sure I caught this when it first aired on the SciFi channel some years back. Although not on par with the books I thought it would make an interesting series.
But as expected the same idiots who cancelled Farscape decided not to give this a chance.
The bottom line is that since this was intended as a series pilot it doesn't really have a middle or end just a beginning. So unless someone decided to foot the bill for production of more episodes you are left with the first chapter of a story that will never have a second.

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