Taglines: A thousand feet beneath the sea, the blackest holes are in the mind…
Sphere movie storyline. Barry Levinson directed this $100+ million adaptation of Michael Crichton’s science fiction novel about the investigation of a half-mile-long spacecraft sitting on the South Pacific ocean floor. Government functionary Barnes (Peter Coyote) assembles a crack scientific team — psychologist Dr. Norman Goodman (Dustin Hoffman), who wrote a presidential report on alien contact; biochemist Beth Halperin (Sharon Stone), once involved romantically with Goodman; mathematician Harry Adams (Samuel L. Jackson); and astrophysicist Ted Fielding (Liev Schreiber).
After descending a thousand feet, they set up housekeeping at their underwater Habitat base, suit up, and enter the craft, finding evidence that it’s a U.S. ship from the future. However, the craft’s cargo of a shimmering, golden sphere is definitely alien. After Harry contrives to enter the sphere, Norman notes his odd behavior.
When the Habitat computer system receives an email message from the sphere (“I am happy”), it’s not long before the messages from this entity take a threatening turn (“I will kill you all”), triggering fears to surface along with violent attacks to the Habitat. The film is divided into chapters, such as “The Ride Down,” “The First Exchange,” and “The Monster.” Shot on soundstages at the abandoned Mare Island Naval Shipyard (Vallejo, California), the effects combine animation, miniatures, prosthetics, animatronics, and digital images. Ed Asner reads the Sphere audiobook.
Sphere is a 1998 American science fiction thriller film directed and produced by Barry Levinson. It stars Dustin Hoffman, Sharon Stone, Samuel L. Jackson, Peter Coyote, Liev Schreiber, Queen Latifah, Marga Gómez, Huey Lewis, Michael Keys Hall and Ralph Tabakin. Sphere was based on the 1987 novel of the same name by Michael Crichton. The film was released in the United States on February 13, 1998.
Hoffman joined the cast because of Levinson’s involvement. Hoffman and Levinson had collaborated on several prior projects, and Hoffman had faith that Levinson could raise the project beyond its script. Due to budgetary concerns, production stopped in October 1996 and the script was revised. While Levinson waited for production to resume on Sphere, he directed Wag the Dog, which also stars Hoffman. Shooting began again in March 1997 with a budget that Variety estimated at $80 million. Shooting took place at a naval base on Mare Island in Vallejo, California. Principal photography ended in July 1997 after 68 days.
Sphere initially had a Christmas release date but was moved forward to avoid competition. Warner Bros. released the film theatrically in the US on February 13, 1998, where it debuted in third place and grossed $37 million total. The Los Angeles Times characterized it as a flop. Sphere grossed $50.1 million worldwide.
About the Story
An alien spacecraft is discovered on the floor of the Pacific Ocean, estimated to have been there for nearly 300 years. A team of experts, including marine biologist Dr. Beth Halperin, mathematician Dr. Harry Adams, astrophysicist Dr. Ted Fielding, psychologist Dr. Norman Goodman, and U.S. Navy Capt. Harold Barnes, are assembled and taken to the Habitat, a state-of-the-art living environment located near the spacecraft.
Upon examination of the spacecraft, they determine that it is not alien at all, but rather American in origin. However, its technology far surpasses any in the present day. The ship’s computer logs cryptically suggest either a mission originating in the distant past or future, but the team manages to deduce that the long dead crew were tasked with collecting an item of scientific importance.
Goodman and Halperin discover the ship’s logs, which show the ship encountering an “unknown event” (thought to be a black hole) that sends the vessel back in time. Goodman and the others eventually stumble upon a large, perfectly spherical ball of fluid hovering a few feet above the floor in the ship’s cargo bay. They cannot find any way to probe the inside of the sphere, and the surface is impenetrable; the crew finds it odd that the surface of the sphere reflects its surroundings except for humans.
They return to the Habitat, and Harry comes to believe that everyone on this team is fated to die. His rationale is that if they survive, their reports will be known by the spacecraft’s crew on their future mission, and the crew will be able to foresee and avoid the black hole, thus avoiding the “unknown event” referenced in the logs, and not ending up where Harry’s team has found it. During the night, Harry returns to the spacecraft and is able to enter the sphere, then returns to the Habitat. The next day, the crew discovers a series of numeric-encoded messages appearing on the computer screens; the crew is able to decipher them and come to believe they are speaking to “Jerry”, an alien intelligence from the sphere. They find Jerry is able to see and hear everything that happens on the Habitat.
A powerful typhoon strikes the surface, and the Habitat crew are forced to stay several more days. During that time, a series of tragedies strike the crew, including attacks from aggressive jellyfish and a giant squid and equipment failures in the base, killing Ted and the team’s support staff. The survivors, Beth, Harry, and Norman believe Jerry to be responsible.
While waiting for rescue, the three begin to realize that the hazards that the others had befallen were manifestations of their own fears. They all believe that they have entered the sphere, which has given them the ability to make their fears real. Norman discovers that they had misinterpreted the initial messages from Jerry and that the entity speaking to them through the computers is actually Harry himself, transmitted while he is asleep.
Sphere (1998)
Directed by: Barry Levinson
Starring: Dustin Hoffman, Sharon Stone, Samuel L. Jackson, Peter Coyote, Liev Schreiber, Queen Latifah, Marga Gómez, Huey Lewis, Michael Keys Hall, Ralph Tabakin
Screenplay by: Stephen Hauser, Paul Attanasio
Production Design by: Norman Reynolds
Cinematography by: Adam Greenberg
Film Editing by: Stu Linder
Costume Design by: Gloria Gresham
Set Decoration by: Anne Kuljian
Art Direction by: Mark W. Mansbridge, Jonathan McKinstry
Music by: Elliot Goldenthal
MPAA Rating: PG-13 for sci-fi action including some startling images.
Distributed by: Warner Bros. Pictures
Release Date: February 13, 1998
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