Stargate

Stargate (1994) is about a ring found in Egypt that turns out to be a door to another planet. Daniel Jackson is a linguist pushed out of academia for arguing that the Egyptians did not build the pyramids. The military calls him in for a job: the symbols on an enormous stone ring found at Giza in 1928 cannot be deciphered. He works out that they are constellations, and the ring operates. On the other side is a desert planet inhabited by the descendants of people brought from ancient Egypt. The being who rules them presents himself as Ra. The idea is that the Egyptian gods are a misunderstood civilisation. Science fiction had used that before, but the film stages it as an archaeological adventure. The section where Jackson works out the language is the best of it; he recognises words through their sounds and communication builds slowly. Roland Emmerich directed and wrote it with Dean Devlin; the two went on to make Independence Day. Kurt Russell and James Spader star. The film's real legacy is not itself. The series that began as Stargate SG-1 ran ten seasons, two further series followed, and together they left the film far behind. What most people mean by Stargate today is largely television. Emmerich and Devlin had planned a trilogy; the sequels were never made. It runs 121 minutes. Good for: nineties science fiction, adventure, and curiosity about what preceded the series. Less good for: the characters are thin and the last section becomes ordinary action.