User Reviews

The Max Knight character is a blend of James Bond, Derek Flint and Gadget Boy. The movie itself has plot elements similar to Knight Rider 2000. Throw in some Gibson-like speak and this combo makes for a slightly annoying (the villains) yet basically fun movie (and obviously a failed TV pilot). The affable Mr. Landes went on to play a vaguely reminiscent swaggering character in the series Special Unit 2.

This is mediocre sci-fi at its best, and I've seen a lot of mediocre and BAD sci-fi (I have Cinemax). It won't enrich your life, but it won't detract from it either. You may even think of the movie time-to-time and lament how it could have been great but just wasn't quite right.

All-in-all, worth watching if you've got extra time. I'm glad that in the US, Sci-Fi Channel occasionally takes these unpolished gems out of the closet for all to see.

Bonus shirtless scene for Michael Landes fans.

what can i say, i enjoyed this film when i saw it at 2 am. it is the perfect type of film to watch when you can't sleep. it's silly, fun, and you don't need to think. i understand, and agree, that the writing was horrid, and had no idea what is was talking about, but that added to the cheese factor. it also felt like an extended TV series episode. but sometimes this type of movie is just what you need to put a smile on your face. the acting was cute, what more can i say. Michael Landes and Rachel Blakely played their roles with just the perfect amount of cheese that lets the audience root for them. what more can i say? it could have been better (writers, know what you are talking about next time), but i definitely could have been worse!! just don't expect it to be much more then fun and silly.

Max Knight is not a good movie - but within its own context, its easy to enjoy.

Imagine every cyberpunk cliché of the 90s crammed into a horrible package that tries so hard to be slick and cool that it's nearly refreshing in its own overwhelming naiveté.

Everything about this movie suffers: From its low budget, poor writing, poor acting, boring direction, dated lackluster special effects, and its total absence of a costume fabricator. Plot-wise, there is little to no creative resolution of any of the conflicts that arise, character growth is nonexistent, and there are times when the twists are so clichéd and predictable that they take you by complete surprise (as contrary as this sounds).

Max Knight explores themes commonly associated to cyberpunk - dystopian corporate oppression, a "fight the power, power to the people" individualist mentality, and how the world might change when the division between life and technology becomes nearly invisible - with such an utter lack of tact that the shallowness has a childlike, endearing quality to it.

This would be a great movie to watch at a party with a group of friends who aren't expecting anything new or interesting from it beyond an example of how not to make a low-budget film, expecting any sort of career boost.

An entertaining film if its taken as lightly as it deals with the actual subject matter that it presents.

Bonus points for: Inventing new, horribly-cheesy slang terms. "Wouldn't want to get ZORCHED."

I came into MAX thinking it was going to be pretty bad but was surprised by how much fun it was. The techno gobbildy gook was a bit much for my unenlightened mind but I let it wash over me because the performers were so good.

Rachel Blakely is a treasure. I know she is an Australian actress but her American accent is so good that you tend to forget that fact (Edited for sudden information alert: Turns out her father *is* an American - dah! - no wonder!). She's beautiful and compelling and fun in a double part. She's both Max's (would-be) girlfriend and his jealous avatar helper.

Max himself is a little too good to be true but very handsome and capable. Every girl likes that!

Enjoyable -- and my husband and daughter thought so too.

Thumbs up!

Well what do you expect from a B-grade flick that actually had to rip off scenes from or had to use an existing video game (Half-Life) for its "virtual reality" sequences? Well, at least they took the trouble of animating the bad guy in it as well and for that, besides his get up, I won't give it a 1/10. While it may be as B grade and corny and pointless as it gets and while you may not figure out if a plot exists at all, Max Knight is not really that annoying, provided that you don't wince at each and every line of corny dialog thrown at you. But it eventually does get boring and pointless and perhaps it would have been much better as a porno. If you want to be amused for the wrong reasons and have absolutely nothing better to do, then watching this movie is pardonable.

What a hopelessly cheeseball piece of trash! It was mildly amusing, but utterly ridiculous. Goes in the same category as "Double Dragon" - cute actors, silly story, totally goofball. A good way to waste a Sunday afternoon, though.

If there was a grade 0, this film would definitely be worth it. Honestly... The acting sucks, the script was not worth the paper it was printed on, and the special effects was at hobby level.

The main character Max is some sort of high-tech James Bond, without all the charm that makes Bond good. And let us not even discuss the villain... ... or his "Spice Girls henchwomen". If the guy portraying Max was bad, this is below zero in acting.

And as said, the script would probably have been better if you just let a program randomize words on paper.

At first this film was amusing just for being so silly and bad, but after only a half an hour it wasn't even fun because it sucked. It just sucked too much.

Oh dear... where to begin? Everything in this movie was so excruciatingly bad and awful that I could only manage to glance at it briefly every fifteen-twenty minutes. I have a theory that this movie was originally supposed to be a pilot episode of a new series; that doesn't really change how implausibly bad it is. It just makes me happy to see that, even though even the worst ideas for new TV-shows slip through and become pilot episodes, only the least horrible actually gets picked up by studios. The plot is poorly written, thought up and put together. It's so simple that I could easily follow it, even though I barely paid attention to the film at all. The pacing is just plain bad. I couldn't muster up the effort to look at the screen for more than about a half minute or less before turning my attention to something else, something more stimulating, which, when it comes to this movie, can be drawing circles on a piece of paper or counting cracks in the ceiling. The acting is atrocious. It appears that most of the actors are Aussies... Australians, I feel your pain. I would embarrassed too. The characters are, as another reviewer points out, cardboard cutouts. Paperthin and empty, with no personality. Everyone's either 100% good or evil. The dialog is painful and embarrassing to listen to. Lines like "They looked like evil Spice Girls" and "Help! Lesbian rapists!" just make me cringe, and I'm sure I'm not the only one. The script is as lackluster and uninspired as they come. Every trick in the book is here, for action/sci-fi/spy movies: the bad guy kidnaps one of the good guys, and tries to bring her over to his side, the hero has got every single gadget imaginable at his disposal, the bad guy wants to destroy the entire world for no particular reason... I could go on, but I see no point in it. The hero spouts one-liners that would make Arnold Schwarzenegger cringe. Need I continue? This is just a truly pointless and entirely skip-worthy film that has no redeeming features and nothing memorable or even slightly original. I recommend this to easily impressed teenagers, and urge anyone else to find something better to do with their time. 1/10

I found this movie when I was hanging out with some friends at my house and my mom turned on the TV to the Sci-Fi Channel (which I was watching to pass the time before my friends arrived). She shouts out to us (we were in the other room), "Stephanie, come quick! It's roller-blading spice girls!" Obviously intrigued, we ran into the family room to discover...

MAX KNIGHT!

We could not help but laugh our collective asses off at the horrid puns, stereotypical, two-dimensional characters, and the *ahem* "interesting" plot. The quote-unquote action in this movie is tepid, at best.

However, somehow we could not tear ourselves away from this horrid movie on TV! It was so bad, it was good. It has all the makings of a classic "B" movie: cute, yet relatively unknown actors/actresses; cheesy ending; predictability; special effects that you can figure out exactly how they did it with Adobe Premiere; absolutely horrid puns and dialogue that left you wondering, "What the hell?" every now and then.

This is definately one of those movies to invite a whole bunch of friends over and make a big vat of popcorn and just have fun! And, if MST3K was still in production, I'm sure they would do this one most entertainingly.

I had the misfortune of stumbling across this move 4 days ago on showtime. I was so embarrassed as an Australian to see so many of our crap actors p1ssing around, coughing out ghastly puns and trying desperately to be American. I recently saw the bloke who plays Max Knight in an ad for cold and flu tablets (Hasn't he taken the next step up!) , fortunately it's a non-speaking role. He (The actor who plays Max Knight) is quite simply one of the the worst actors I've ever seen, Rachel Blakely can't do an American accent to save her life...nor can thew rest of the cast. I recommend watching this move if you are a budding actor, writer or director because it will give you a great confidence boost seeing the standard of bollocks that makes it to an international audience. 0/10

"Max Knight: Ultra Spy" is a television movie about a young, hip "James Bond-type" super spy.

The film is filled with cool gadgets, hot women, and really impressive cg special effects.

The villains are a group of computer hackers intent on downloading their minds to the Internet and destroying the world. They speak in computer jargon reminiscent of "A Clockwork Orange" and are the hippest bad guys I've seen in a long time.

Max appears to be part cyborg and has a cg assistant modeled after a beautiful woman. The action in the film is great... but the best thing about it is the humor. I was laughing at loud at the pop culture and computer references.

This one is definitely worth checking out!

I agree that this was most likely a failed TV pilot turned into a TV movie... and it's thoroughly average. You'll expect all the cliché cyberpunk moments and spy moments. But, hey, at least Blakely looks good here.

Oh, and it also features perhaps the first use of "machinima" in the film... about five minutes of the movie is in "Half Life". Maybe it's a big product placement, I don't know, but if nothing else, this movie has some historical value because of that.

If this is on TV (which is the only way you can see it because it's not on DVD) and you have two hours to waste, you might want to watch this just for that moment. Otherwise, it's fairly forgettable. Chalk it up to the Matrix craze that happened back in 99.

All those out of place computer remarks that show that the author(s) have no idea what they are talking about make this movie a good laugh. It is a comedy, but probaly not in the way the author(s) planned it to be. Could be for the cult classic for 21st century in the same way that Tron was for the 20th.

It's been 3 days since the destruction of the WTC and the Pentagon, and I needed a break from network news. I wasn't going to watch this movie, but since Tuesday, I decided it would be, at the very least, a decent distraction.

I was pleasantly surprised. The acting was above-par, the story was engaging (with plot twists I was NOT expecting), and I forgave the ending. The ending's not bad, it's just cheesy, and too much cheese is bad for you.

If you like computers, this is the movie for you. If you like action without gore, this is the movie for you. If you like things sexy without being gratuitous, this is the movie for you. If you don't like all the things I mentioned . . . well, this is NOT the movie for you, BUT I think you should see it anyway.

By the way, Michael Landes is one sexy spy! Grrrr . ..

:)

Max Knight is a genuinely terrible movie. Its embarrassingly bad. Characters straight out of the Hollywood Box of Cardboard Cutouts, dialog that even Baywatch would be embarrassed to use and a plot that reaches new lows of technobable nonsense.

This movie has not a single redeeming feature. It insults your intelligence even if you're looking for low grade mindless pap.

Do not waste your time with this drivel.

Sad, sad, sad.

Movie was fast paced and the dialogue captured your attention. Max Knight is an interesting and adorable character. Someone who you would like to see more adventures of. Certainly Max Knight is a character that the kids of today can relate to because of the computer aspects and his actions, and yet their parents can enjoy as he comes across experienced and mature yet naive and unsure at the same time.

Ok. This movie is funny. It screams cheap B rating movie. Like said by others. The author knows jack about basics computer and even less about the hacker community. As im typing its being shown on TV here.. Alone the little thing about a girl taking on a VR helmet and suddenly max knight has a detailed 3d image of her entire body.. The movie is a laugh. Especially if you know a bit about computers you´re gonna have a ball.. The "borrowed" HalfLife scenes are a blast.. Its a cult classic, even starwars was corny in some points but still a classic..There is not ONE realistic thing about Max Knight Ultra spy.. but funny.. defenetly.

A story so well written that you are caught up in the plot -on all levels. It is an action adventure flick to be sure, and yet, there is something for everyone as we are also introduced to characters that we can relate to as they wind their way through an original and exciting adventure.

The subtle, intelligent, humor and references to the underground computer scene offer a unique look at the cyber world many of us could only imagine before Max Knight.

All in all an extremely creative venture that one hopes will expand into an ongoing series (either future movies ala JAMES BOND style, or perhaps finding a home on the small screen...??!!) Either way, Mr. Bales had better get writing because we need more surreal adventure in the 21rst century!

Most excellent.

I saw this movie on Sci-Fi Channel...you're not missing much if you skip it over. The movie tries to be a combination of James Bond, "Johnny Mnemonic," and "The Matrix," and falls far short of those goals.

The dialogue made me wince virtually every minute, it was so corny...some of the lines of the "bad guy" hacker and his "avatar" followers sounded as if the scriptwriter just grabbed some random terms out of the Jargon File (or it's print equivalent, "The New Hacker's Dictionary") and stuffed them in with little regard for how techies actually talk. At other times, some characters speak in a computer "jargon" that's almost indecipherable. Most of the characters are cut from cardboard (Max's virtual helpmate Claire being a partial exception) and are unremarkable; even Max's backstory suffers from the same cornball effect as the rest of the dialogue.

To compensate for the lack of good writing, the filmmakers threw in lots of special effects, including a bunch of low-budget CGI work. Let's just say they got what they paid for. Periodically, the camera zooms in or out for no readily apparent reason; it's obviously trying to highlight what there is of the "dramatic tension" at certain moments, but it just fell flat with me.

Basically, if you take this movie for what it is, you might have some fun with it. (It's certainly crying out for the MST3K treatment.) If your expectations aren't low enough, this movie will be about as tough to swallow as two tablespoons of peanut butter.

I work with Teenagers who are in the hospital. We saw this movies description in the paper and sat down to watch it. All of the kids, especially the boys ages 13-17 thought it was great. The writing was unique and right on the level of these teenagers. One of the kids was so into it that he sat and watched the entire movie--something that he had not been able to do before. The dialogue was right in line with the way these kids talk which made this sci-fi movie more real to them. Great movie, well written.

What a great Idea for a new series. I loved the characters. It was very well written. A computer generation "James Bond" is born. I would love to see more.

I just finished watching this on t.v. and thought it was hilarious. Not because it was intended to be a comedy, but because of how horrible it was. I'm the kind of person who watches bad, low-budget movies, just for fun of it, but this went above and beyond. Whoever wrote the screenplay apparently knows nothing about computers and just decided to randomly insert lingo that he had heard and sounded good. My favorite was when one of the extras shouted "We're vaporware!", before running for his life. And is it just me, or does the actor who plays the evil villain, give the air of a mediocre comedian hired to act in this movie. In short, I'm glad I saw this atrocity on cinemax, and didn't have to pay to rent it or anything.