Red Planet 2000
"We're going to film in Iceland and Australia. It's set on Mars so Iceland and Australia is the closest you'll get on earth to Mars. It's about whether God exists or not." ~Val Kilmer
(Note: Plans were later changed and the Iceland site was changed to Jordan.)
They Didn't Find Life on Mars...It Found Them.
Story In the year 2050, Earth is on the verge of ecological disaster, and the Mars Terraforming Project has been created in hopes of making our neighboring planet habitable so that a colony of Earthlings might begin a new civilization there. But the project goes awry, and Commander Kate Bowman (Carrie-Anne Moss) is put in charge of a rescue mission to set the system back on its feet.
Bringing along astronaut Robby Gallagher (Val Kilmer) and scientists Dr. Quinn Burchenal (Tom Sizemore) and Dr. Bud Chantillas (Terrence Stamp), Bowman and her crew set out for Mars, but disaster strikes and the landing craft crashes into the red planet.
The crew is stranded without communications as Bowman struggles to find a way to get them home; to make matters worse, the robot 'AMEE' that was designed to serve and protect them has gone "mustang" and is now attempting to hunt them down as prey.
Cast Val Kilmer, Carrie-Anne Moss, Tom Sizemore, Terrence Stamp
Our Two Cents The idea of finding another planet to live on is not really far fetched. The problem with this film is that after watching the deleted scenes, you realize the crux of the story was cut out, which is too bad.
FYI The Mars 1 main computer 'Lucille' is one of the first 'computer' characters in the history of science fiction films to have a realistic voice that is entirely computer generated. The experimental voice synthesizer software was provided by AT&T Bell Labs.
Kilmer also starred with Sizemore in Heat and True Romance.