No one was expecting this.
No one could have. In 2009 Regeneration was the best action movie
to come out in probably about ten years.
It was simple, executed perfectly, done on a level of quality rarely
seen with low budget action, pretty damn smart and just what the doctor
ordered. We all thought John Hyams was
gonna make essentially the same film again with the next sequel. It was what we all wanted, the same awesome
shit with minimal changes. But that’s
not what John had in mind. This was his
baby now. He was gonna build a UniSol
from the ground up instead of shooting someone else’s script. The results are very interesting. We’ve got a different animal on our hands
here than Regeneration.
For starters we have a new star, Scott Adkins. I’ve known about him for a while now but have
only seen him do bit parts in The
Expendables 2 and Zero Dark Thirty
(I’ll get around to Undisputed 2 and 3 one of these days). So it was a pleasure to finally make his
formal acquaintance. And he’s great. He can pull off some tremendous moves during
the fights and tug at your heart strings during the drama.
Adkins plays John, who we learn is a family man that has ski
mask wearing intruders waiting for him in the kitchen. Those are the worst kind too. They end up beating him and killing his
family. See, I told you. The catch is one of these thugs takes his
mask off and holy shit it’s Luc Deveraux (Van Damme). The rest of the movie is John trying to
figure out what the fuck is going on.
Ok, I know you all want to know how the action is so why
wait? It’s very good with one caveat
that I’ll talk about in a sec. All of
the sequences were choreographed well, shot well and are
balls-to-the-wall. I love the varied use
of weapons like guns, machetes, a hammer, fists, feet, knives, baseball bats
and there’s even a car battle too. That’s
definitely a more accurate description than car chase. Sure they’re driving along a road but these
cars are smashing into each other constantly making the whole thing less about
pursuing and more about destruction.
That sequence leads into probably my favorite fight of the movie. John and UniSol Andrei Arlovski (Universal Soldier: Regeneration, MMA
shit) battle it out in a sporting goods store.
They use the equipment and tear the place and each other up nicely. One of the most impressive sequences though
takes place in this underground cave.
John fights off all these UniSols in what is made to look like one long
shot but in reality is clearly not. It
impresses because Adkins is flying around and shootin’ dudes mercilessly and
beating them to death and it’s just fucking brutal.
All of that shit is fantastic. It’s all shot in a clear yet exciting manner
so there’s no problem following it. The
thing that irritates me though is that some of it, not the majority but a small
portion, has that Matrix-y slow down
speed up treatment done to it. I don’t
fucking understand this. They shot these
beautiful action sequences that are many cuts above what anyone else is doing
right now (besides maybe Nicolas Winding Refn) and they put a layer of shit on
them in post by messing with the playback.
This doesn’t look good. It
totally ruins the flow of the movements, takes me out of the movie and is very
gimmicky. I’m really pretty sure this
shit wasn’t in Regeneration because I
would’ve remembered that. Hyams, I love
you man but this Matrix-y bullshit is
inexcusable.
Speaking of gimmicks this piece was shot in 3D. I couldn’t care less about 3D but I just
thought I’d mention it because I was surprised that they would bother to spend
some of their small budget on it.
One thing I definitely should mention is there are a couple
of seriously seizure inducing strobe scenes.
The screen will pulse white for a long while and test your limit. I personally had to look away after a few
seconds. I feel like Hyams is testing my
manhood with something like that and I’m pretty sure I failed. Shit.
Moving on, while the overall plot is simple (find the dude
who murdered your family), the details of the story are confusing for a long
time. In fact I didn’t fully understand what
was going on until literally the last scene.
And I can’t think of another action movie that’s like that. But don’t think of it as a bad thing. Go with the mystery and stay engrossed. Embrace the unknown and it’ll all make sense
in probably a cooler way than you were expecting. You may not realize it immediately but just
mull it over for a day.
I hope this whole thing didn’t give the impression that I didn’t
like this one. I very much did. Admittedly at first I thought it was just ok
but the more I thought about it and reflected back on all the really cool shit
that was in here the more I appreciated the overhauled storyline and dug the
gritty feel. From what I can remember
this is nastier than Regeneration in
just about every way. Some of the squibs
and head shots are fucking ghastly. Hyams
says on the making-of extra that he’s not pandering to any demographic. He wanted to make a balls-out badass “low to
mid budget” action film. Well, we
certainly got that.
I can’t wait to see what his next movie will be. Hyams is one of only a handful of directors these
days that I feel that way about. He
brings the goods and isn’t afraid to try new shit. He gives me faith in the future of action.
Getting back to Day of
Reckoning, it’s understandable why this didn’t get a favorable
reception. It’s not a remake of Regeneration. It’s different and that’s hard to accept. But give it a chance. Open your mind and you’ll be rewarded with
Van Damme’s head painted completely white on the top half and completely black
on the bottom half. Well, that and an
axe fight where some body parts…get the axe.
I bet you didn’t expect this review to end on a really bad pun, did you?
Initially when the movie was over I said that I liked
it. And overall I guess I still do. But the more I thought about it and the more I
discussed it with others a lot of flaws started to appear. “The greatest manhunt in history” turned out to
be kind of less interesting than I thought it would be.
Let’s start with Jessica Chastain (The Tree of Life) who plays Maya.
I thought she was good until she has an outburst with her boss and
suddenly everything Chastain was doing seemed very contrived. This is an extremely pouty performance and I
was fed up with this character about half way through. And this has nothing to do with Maya being a
strong female. I’m all for that but why
the fuck is she acting like a child? This
person is supposed to be a fairly high ranked CIA operative which means she’s
gonna follow the chain of command. She’s
not gonna throw a tantrum or write on her boss’s door every day the number of
days of inactivity it’s been since bin Laden’s compound was found. Be a fucking professional lady. And the part at the end where she cries was
really forced. As it was pointed out to
me, if this character had been a man they sure as shit wouldn’t have had him
cry at the conclusion of this operation.
All we know about Maya is that she’s tenacious and has to have her
way. She wants to find and kill bin
Laden and that’s it. We don’t know
anything else about her except for the inadvertently comedic line where she
mentions that she was recruited by the CIA out of high school (I don’t care if
the CIA really does do that, it just sounds stupid). Now that I think about it this fact could
explain her unprofessional behavior. My
point is this protagonist is pretty one dimensional and that was disappointing.
What was also disappointing was the manhunt itself, which is
most of the movie. I think they started
too far back in time. I totally understand
that 9/11 needs to be in there because, after all, this is the reason why we
wanted bin Laden’s head on a platter. But
I think you could start the story with discovering the compound or possibly
with the courier stuff. Everything else
before that could’ve been summed up either in text or narration before the film
beings proper. If you want to show some torture,
I get it, go for it. But there is just a
lot of very little going on until the compound is found. However, I could see an argument being made
that the length of the movie mimics the length of the manhunt and how long and
difficult it was to find bin Laden. That’s
a fair point.
The raid on the compound was excellent though and by far the
best part of the movie. I love how it
was cut and dry with no music or very fancy camera work. It felt more like a documentary at that
point, like Kathryn Bigelow had somehow gone back in time and sent a camera
crew with Seal Team 6 on their mission. And
even though I knew how it was all going to play out the adrenaline was pumping
and I couldn’t wait to see what was around the next corner. It was such a smart choice to have the death
of bin Laden be relatively uneventful too.
The Seals kill a bunch of dudes and then one of them over the radio says
they may have him but they’re not totally certain. There’s no slow-mo shot or musical cue or
anything. Beautifully done.
I have to admit that the raid is a damn good payoff. But at the same time it should’ve been the
second half of the film. I mean I was
really let down that we don’t get to know Seal Team 6. I still cared about them and didn’t want to
see them get hurt regardless but we’re not told a single thing about them
here. I was expecting a montage of these
dudes getting handpicked for the job after doing some impressive Seal type
shit.
Before I checked this out I was surprised, like the rest of
the world, when Bigelow wasn’t nominated for an Oscar for best director this
year. And even though I think the
Academy Awards are all bullshit and politics anyway, I can see why they didn’t
give her a nomination. The
cinematography and the production design are great but the script and the lead
actress are not. Some of the dialogue in
particular is really bad and I had a bunch of examples but I can’t remember
them now. Although, it was pretty cool
when that CIA guy yells “bring me people to kill!”
The main problem here is the script. It’s not tight enough and was way more
movie-ish (if you know what I mean) than I was expecting. There are too many unnecessary details and
flat characters. The story focuses too
much on Maya which doesn’t feel right. I
don’t care about her. I want to know
about the team that had to train and execute the raid. It might have been nice to get some
background on bin Laden too ‘cause they don’t tell you shit about him in
this. He’s portrayed purely as a boogeyman
like he was in real life. But I’m not
sure how well that would’ve fit, just thinking out loud. Anyway, it seems like everything leading up
to the compound part wasn’t crazy or unbelievable. That shit unfolded in an uninteresting
way. But how we deciphered that bin
Laden was staying at the compound and the actual revenge part where he gets
shot in the fucking eye was the good shit.
That’s your story.
This ain’t no Hurt
Locker. That was really entertaining
but also really informative. Zero Dark Thirty doles out the info in a
stiff manner which makes it harder to absorb.
But then again, you’re apparently being misinformed anyway. As a movie this isn’t bad but it’s not great
either.
And if you take a step back this is classic Bigelow really. Her films are pretty hit or miss. Since The
Hurt Locker was good she won’t have a good one again for another one or two
movies. I liked Near Dark better than this but they’re similar in that they both
have one incredible segment out of an otherwise, honestly, forgettable picture. Bigelow can definitely make some magic happen;
she’s just not very consistent.
The long story, the acting, the dialogue, the costumes, the
lighting and some of the camera work make this feel more like a mid-level
budget TV show than a summer blockbuster.
The whole thing feels very fake and kind of uncool.
But first I gotta get something off my chest. I can’t stand the costume design in this
picture. A lot of people are dressed in
these rags that look cumbersome and they’re like someone’s idea of what old
English folks would wear without doing any actual research. They look too much like what they actually
are: cheap Hollywood costumes that were all designed by one person which makes
everyone look the same. These are
outfits that you would find in a theme park stunt show (which would be
appropriate), not a major film production.
And Reynolds uses this same exact look in Waterworld. I swear they’re
recycled, they just modified the getups slightly.
And this is part of that uncool thing I brought up. Out of the four Kevin Reynolds movies I’ve
seen I only like one of them (The Count
of Monte Cristo (2002)) and another is just ok (187). But this and Waterworld are sister films. They both have the same feel and look. Between the two I’m not sure which is
better. Robin Hood is more competently made so it makes me want to pick
that one. But I have to admit that Waterworld is a unique idea and it’s
just a weird flick. So it actually might
be a little more interesting in that regard.
But you wouldn’t be seen with either fucking movie. It’s not cool to own these films, especially Robin Hood.
Just like how I’m sure no one did research on the costumes, I’m
sure no one did research on anything else.
This production of the old tales comes off as such a Hollywood douchebag
vision. I could see this guy in the
initial meeting saying, “we got to have a big explosion at the end, we have to
include a black side kick so it’s like those really popular buddy cop movies
like Lethal Weapon and Another 48 Hrs., we need to cast someone
in the lead part who’s smokin’ hot right now (who gives a shit if they’re right
for the role, they’ll bring in a ton of people to see it), Robin needs a long
lost brother character too, for the love interest have it be a childhood friend
so there’s already a connection, the bad guy needs to be flat out evil with no
redeeming qualities, Robin will encounter and bond with his band of merry men
over a misunderstanding of some kind, oh and we need a big brief cameo ‘cause the
audience will love that shit, etc.” I
think you get the idea. This is a pure
Hollywood birth.
But it’s not that this movie isn’t watchable because it
certainly is. You definitely get the
feeling though that every decision made about the film was money driven and
that any artistic choices were either quashed altogether or subdued as much as
possible.
Case in point is who they cast in the title role. Kevin Costner had a string of hit pictures
leading up to this one including Bull
Durham, Field of Dreams and Dances
with fucking Wolves. He was
huge. The problem is Costner isn’t a
very versatile actor and can’t play just any role. Robin
Hood proves that. Costner gives
maybe his worst performance ever and definitely does the worst job in this
(along with Christian Slater who is probably equally as bad). Every single word out of his mouth sounds
like he’s reading it for the first time.
Not only that but he doesn’t look the part either. Aside from the very beginning when Robin is
in the Jerusalem prison Costner looks like some fuckin’ American dude. Big surprise: that’s because he is. He should’ve had a beard or different hair or
something to make him look like he actually gave a shit about this thing. It comes off like Costner couldn’t be
bothered to prepare for the role in any way.
Although he apparently tried to do an English accent but it was so
horrible they had to nix the idea. I do
agree with that. If the actor can’t do
the accent then they shouldn’t force it.
Morgan Freeman? I’m
not for or against him in general. He’s
just kinda there and takes on the elder wise man part fine. He also serves partially as comic relief (this
task was divided up between many characters) by pointing out differences
between his culture (Moorish) and Robin’s (English). You know, hilarious classic Yakov Smirnoff
type shit.
Marian is played by Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio (The Abyss, The Color of Money) and she
probably gives the best performance along with Freeman. I mean she’s not as good as she usually is
but she works with what she’s got. She
goes through a range of emotions like anger, happiness, sadness, nervousness, sacredness
(?) and she even goes halfway with the English accent which makes her sound more
like a snotty American but whatever.
The saving grace of the cast should’ve been Alan Rickman but
he’s not that good in this. He plays one
of those pathetic villains. He’s a pussy
and a whiner, not macho at all. And no
matter how hard he tries shit never goes his way, not even once. It’s a little sad because we never see him
score a real victory so he’s just some asshole that keeps getting screwed over. My heart doesn’t really go out to him though because
he doesn’t let up on his jackass personality.
Like at the end of the movie he tries to rape Marian and I’m not gonna
get behind someone that does that shit. Supposedly
Rickman had total freedom to do what he wanted with the role and that does seem
to make sense. I could see the studio
wanting a much less prissy and much more traditionally bad ass masculine
motherfucker, the kind that had been dominating action films for a long
while. But Rickman already played one of
those in Die Hard just a few years
earlier so I’m sure he wanted to change things up. I can respect that.
Unfortunately Michael Wincott (The Crow, Strange Days, Metro) is wasted in his role as Rickman’s
number two. He’s not in it very much and
whenever he is he’s getting his ass handed to him. I don’t believe him as someone so weak. Wincott should pretty much always be the one
kicking the ass.
Speaking of action, there’s a fair amount here. In that Hollywood douchebag meeting for this
film he must’ve strongly insisted that this not be rated R. Widen the net and rake in as much money as
possible. This makes for some awkward
sequences. Like Robin Hood shoots an
arrow into a guy’s forehead at least twice (one of those is a flaming arrow
too) but they had to find angles to shoot that stuff from so it wouldn’t look like
the fucking horrific thing that it is. Blood
is kept to a minimum as well. But at
least they weren’t afraid to kill people.
A lot of henchmen get murdered and that’s a blessing from the era that
this movie was made in. It looks like most
or all of the action scenes weren’t shot with a set choreography in mind but
rather they just tried a bunch of stuff and pieced it together later. The sorta messy editing during those parts
seems to point to that.
So overall this is not a great film. There’s a lot to dislike here. It’s lame and contrived. I never got caught up in the story or cared
very much for any of the characters. But
despite all the shit I said I don’t think it’s completely terrible. We’re given some adventure, some swordplay,
some arrow…play and it’s a fairly big story so there is some scope to it. The sets and scenes that were shot on
location look great. The lighting at
times can be very moody and wonderful but at others it makes absolutely no
sense (there’s one scene where it’s completely overcast outside but when Robin
steps inside the building the sun is gleaming through a stained glass
window). So there are some fun little
moments.
In the end though, this is no one’s favorite version of
Robin Hood. I remember the ’38 one
starring Errol Flynn being fucking awesome but it’s been a long time. Also, Robin
Hood: Men in Tights is a direct response to this Costner one and I think it’s
really funny so you might want to check that out too.
Todd Phillips isn’t a mystery anymore. He once was a while back but it’s clear the
path he’s chosen for himself. He used to
be one helluva documentarian. If you haven’t
seen Hated: G.G. Allin & the Murder
Junkies then you really should. It’s
one of the filthiest and also best docs out there. It’s a pretty incredible thing to see someone
like Allin not care about a single solitary thing, his music, his friends, his
health or his life. He’s a fascinating
subject and the movie is well made too.
From there Phillips wanted to tackle fraternities and the
shit you have to go through to join one.
It’s another great topic of discussion.
The physical and mental abuse that the pledges go through is
horrific. And it’s one thing to hear
stories about that kinda shit and another to actually witness it. The whole process is relentlessly brutal and
of course the question posed at the end of the movie is ultimately the driving
factor: “why is it that some guys are so afraid of standing out that they will
do almost anything to fit in?”
The idea was to film the entire pledge procedure, including
the infamous hazing, but Phillips was shut out before getting too deep into
it. One frat tells him that they’ll let
him film everything but the catch is Phillips needs to pledge himself. And he actually does it! Now that’s being dedicated to your art.
This was shot for HBO as part of their America Undercover
series but they never aired it.
According to Wikipedia the reason for this was because some people who
either worked on the doc or who were in it claimed that parts were re-enacted
and not genuine. I understand the
thinking behind this because if you’re gonna call something a documentary it
should be authentic; otherwise you’re just making a regular fictional movie. But at least in this case, does it really
matter? I mean even if the hazing shit
was re-enacted that doesn’t automatically make what you’re showing a false
representation. The frat brothers did in
the past and will continue to do in the future more or less what you’re
watching. Of course there’ll be
variations and new techniques developed but if you’re repeating for the camera in
full fashion what you did a couple of months ago then I don’t see there being a
big problem here. Phillips and the other
pledges really are getting beer, food and other shit poured on them. They really are doing pushups and standing on
their heads ‘n shit. The idea undoubtedly
comes across. If these are re-enactments
it’s fine because we know that frats do this shit for real. There isn’t any speculation. It’s not like Phillips is exposing something
that people have no clue about. He’s
painting a clearer picture of what we already know.
Maybe it’s because of what happened with this film that made
Phillips decide to become a bro comedy director. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to make
those movies. I’m sure in a lot of ways
they’re easier to make than these docs he was doing. But it’s kind of a shame because I think we
lost a great documentary filmmaker.
Whatever, Frat House is a
really interesting and great watch.
Check it out.
You know, I’m a little embarrassed. This whole time I’ve been pronouncing it the
way it looks, like the footwear. The
same way you would say “I’m gonna stick my boot in your ass”. But it’s supposed to be pronounced the same
way we say “boat” in English. Well the
damage might already be done. I don’t
know if I can change the way I say it now.
By the way it’s a pretty good movie that Das Boat.
The most interesting thing about it, at least for me, is
that our heroes are Nazis. I mean, most
of the world agrees that they were kinda bad people. But I’ve never seen such a humanization of
this group before. Usually Nazis are
portrayed as robots, unemotional, insensitive, endlessly suspicious, distant,
arrogant, narrow-minded, brutes, cold blooded fuckin’ murders, etc. None of that exists in this film. The crew of U-96 gets scared shitless, they
worry, they get bored, they get cabin fever, they play games and try to keep
themselves entertained. These guys are
just doin’ their job. The captain (Jurgen
Prochnow (In the Mouth of Madness, Judge
Dredd)) never talks about how puny or stupid the allies are. In fact he respects them when they put up a
good fight.
I wanted to see all of these characters make it through their
mission. I wanted them to succeed and
blow up ships when they had to and make a safe getaway when they had to. It was always in the back of mind that these
sonsabitches are Nazis but my emotional attachment overruled that notion.
Wolfgang Petersen said he wanted to make the most realistic
submarine movie ever and it seems like he did just that. Since almost the entire thing takes place on
the sub there is a very claustrophobic feel to it all. You can see the descent into boredom, fear
and general untidiness and uncleanliness that the sailors go through and it’s a
little depressing to watch. Things don’t
always go smoothly, in fact very little goes smoothly, and my heart went out to
these poor bastards. They weren’t all up
Hitler’s ass or nothin’ the whole time.
They were too busy worrying about trying to keep themselves alive.
With this realism, however, also comes classic Hollywood
type shit (yeah, I know it’s a German film but the same shit applies). The entire part where they need to repair the
sub and lift her to the surface towards the end is the kind of triumph over
strife against all odds you’ve seen a million times. Another example is the Lieutenant that the
story is, sorta, told through. He’s on
board as a war correspondent and his idea of life on a U-boat is glorious and exciting. Of course, it’s completely terrifying and
totally different than what he imagined.
None of this is bad though. I
just wasn’t expecting there to be so many movie-ish elements at play here.
However, the very end of the picture is absolutely
incredible. Don’t worry, I won’t spoil
it for you. I have to give Petersen
credit for going with this. He took your
typical ending (one of two possible classic type conclusions) threw it on the
ground, pulled down his pants and took a horrifically messy shit all over it. I absolutely loved it. This is one of the ballsiest and most
audience-snubbing endings I’ve ever seen period. And this is at the close of a three and a
half hour epic too (I saw the Director’s Cut version). Bravo Petersen.
It’s weird that he went on to make some pretty shitty movies
like In the Line of Fire, Air Force One
and The Perfect Storm. They’re very watchable (well I’m not sure
about The Perfect Storm) but they’re
not films that exhibit such a great balance of cheese, realism and drama. Nor do they possess very big balls. Maybe a small set of balls, but not big ones. I did enjoy Outbreak though. And I do
have to see Shattered.
Das Boat isn’t
perfect. It can be repetitious but maybe
that’s the point. Life aboard a sub was
a cycle of waiting for the enemy, battling the enemy, recovering from the
battle. And you’re trapped inside this
fuckin’ tin can underwater for weeks or months or however the fuck long these grueling
deployments lasted. But even with the three
and a half hour running time I’m not sure what could’ve been cut out. I wonder how the theatrical cut compares. It’s an hour shorter which seems like there
would be way too much material left out but maybe it works fine. I’ll have to figure that out one day.
Anyway, I know this isn’t news but this is a fine sea going
vessel here. It really is just a very
cool picture. See it.
1. I saw Dragon
Eyes like six months ago and meant to write about it but just never got
around to it. Anyway, it’s not nearly as
good as Hyam’s previous film, Universal
Soldier: Regeneration. The story and
action scenes don’t seem to be as fleshed out.
One fight scene is really baffling too where Cung Le (The Man with the Iron Fists) goes up
against like six or seven dudes and it’s all done in a horrendously Matrix-y way where they constantly slow
the footage down and then speed it up again.
I can’t stand that shit. Hyams
didn’t pull that kinda crap in Regeneration. So that along with the less complex and also
less interesting characters I would say that this is definitely a step back for
him. But still, this picture is better
than a lot of other action movies that get released theatrically these days.
2. Jack
Reacher wasn’t very good but did anyone else really enjoy that car
chase? I thought it was done pretty damn
well and it was impressive to have a lot of shots in there showing Tom Cruise actually
driving the car for real for a good portion of it. Werner Herzog was fantastic too. I love that they made him all fucked up with
a bad eye and no fingers. He also has
that incredible voice with a menacing delivery.
It’s just a shame that they didn’t give him anything to do.
3. Unfortunately Hoodlum wasn’t the gem I was hoping it would be. It was a little too confusing to follow, I
couldn’t understand a lot of Tim Roth’s lines and it looks cheap, like really
cheap. Also the acting is not very good
with the exception of Laurence Fishburne.
Some of these aspects could work in the film’s favor but it just moves
too slowly and the characters were underdeveloped. I had high hopes for this Bill Duke period
crime drama but alas. Although, the
“split” scene is fucking great and the best part of the movie.
4. I don’t get The
Godfather: Part II. Or maybe I
should say I don’t get why everyone loves The
Godfather: Part II. The first film I
do get. It’s a masterpiece. But I thought the sequel was pretty
boring. I don’t think the
two-movies-in-one thing worked with the separate Vito and Michael stories. If they had each been their own picture then
we probably would’ve gotten a better third movie than Part III (believe all the shit you hear about Sofia Coppola’s
acting being atrocious, she really is terrible in it). It’s weird for me because Vito is by far a
better character than Michael but I wasn’t that interested in how he got his
start. Michael is pretty uninteresting
to begin with but on top of that Al Pacino plays him so stiff. You could put a cardboard cutout of Pacino in
front of the camera and just have him record his dialogue later and the movie
would be no worse. However, I found
myself in a conundrum because I was more interested in his storyline than
Vito’s. Michael’s plot was more exciting
because it involved the same type of sinister shit that made the first one so
good and not deal with just one small time asshole who wants a piece of Vito’s
action. So the two major stories of the
film I had inverse issues with. This
film is no doubt epic but best sequel ever made or even as good as part
one? I don’t see it. When it was all said and done I thought Part II was only a little better than Part III. It wasn’t night and day like I was led to
believe.
6. I kind of hope they don’t make the other two Girl with the Dragon Tattoo books into
movies here in the U.S. I saw the Swedish
sequels and man are they boring. They
don’t have anywhere near as good of a story as the first one. Lisbeth seems like a good character to have stories
about but the ones Stieg Larsson came up with are just tedious. Oh and does anyone else think that guy looks
like John Hughes? Shit, maybe John faked his own death and became Stieg.
“I can hear your heart beating. I don’t like that”
Sonuvabitch. Sorry
guys, I meant to have this done for New Year’s Eve but I just totally forgot. Well, there’s not much to say about this one
anyway. A killer goes for a victim every
time the new year is rung in across the time zones in the U.S. I kinda like this idea but the thing is only
two murders actually follow this gimmick while the rest happen at nonspecific
times. I would’ve liked to have seen a
little more discipline with the script but what are you gonna do, right?
Also, the killer isn’t threatening looking or sounding
(especially when he does that jaw harp voice on the phone) and his weapon of
choice is a switchblade which seems kinda puny and not very scary at all. Although he does kill one woman using a sack
of weed which is a new twist on the ol’ plastic-bag-over-the-head gag. And the way he tries to murder his final
victim (hanging them from the bottom of an elevator with the intent of crushing
them) is something I’m pretty sure I haven’t seen before. But other than those it’s standard fare.
I guess like the usual New Year’s celebrations they show on
TV the filmmakers threw in a bunch of live music in between the killings to
make it seem more like you’re watching an event. You know, like you’re enjoying a New Year’s festivity
except it keeps getting interrupted with murders. It’s another idea that isn’t that bad, well,
if you’re into new wave 80’s music that is.
Overall this one’s pretty dull. It’s very formulaic with the first half
getting off to a really slow start. The second
half finally picks up some speed and shit starts happening but that’s typical
of most slasher flicks. I’d say skip it
unless you really want to relive New Year’s again.
Now that that’s out of the way, Happy New Year
everyone! Here’s to more good, bad and
ugly movies in 2013.
