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jhoeboer-1
Reviews
Interceptor (2022)
Mediocre but not terrible
I saw the score of this film on here being an average 4.4 and, after having watched it, I am really wondering what mindset some of the people who come here to "review" a film have. You know, people who give this mediocre action flick a 1 or a 2 out of 10. I think those scores say more about their own quality of judgment and sincerity than the film's.
Lets not beat around the bush, this is a very mediocre 'made to make some quick money, straight to DVD' action flick that's full of cliches and plotholes. But to give it a 1 or a 2 is saying that this has the same level of lack of quality as movies like say the Asylum produces. And that's most definitely not the case. The background story they give the protagonist is actually quite interesting from an idea-perspective, it's just poorly implemented into the way it's told.
The acting ranges from subpar to actually quite solid, the sets are simple but serve their purpose (no cartboard walls or foam caves waving in the wind here like in some lesser films) and while the plot is very basic and has plenty of holes (why is such an important facility not protected by more ships/soldiers, how did the enemy team even manage to get there without being picked out when they were screened, why is the main character there when she was supposed to be someplace else, how did her father know she was in trouble etc) it is enough to create a sense of urgency for characters to do the things they need to do.
This is one of those middle of the road 13 a dozen action flicks you can have a laugh at for being silly and cliched in places but it's way better than a 1 or 2.
The Grey (2011)
Interesting, with a few flaws
So The Grey, featuring Liam Neeson in an excellent role, is an interesting flick. A flick with some issues that require you to suspend disbelief but an interesting one nonetheless.
What I liked about the film is how all the characters are likable, even the man who initially behaves like an instigating asshole comes around at the end, showing he's just acting like that to cover up the fact he's just as afraid as everyone else.
The minor picks I had with this film were: - Liam Neeson survives the plane crash completely unscathed. Possible but not very likely seeing as to how they went down. - Why did no one use parts of the plane to fashion weapons when they had already been made aware wolves were going to be an issue. The strips of metal that were scattering the area would have made excellent swords/spears useful for self defense. - Wolves even attacking when they're very close to a fire (the Omega wolf attacking). Or wolves showing almost human ability to plan attacks ahead.
- The 2nd last man drowns in the river because his foot is stuck, so wth did Liam's character not look below the watery surface why he wasn't coming up. Or wth did the guy drowning indeed not hold his breath when he clearly was aware that was he given new air twice. And why did Liam's character not die of hypothermia after haven fallen into a freezingly cold stream prior to this entire scene.
So yes the film does require some suspense of disbelief. But the whole vibe (the comradery, the desolate landscape) makes up for this and ends up coming together as a solid film about human survival instincts, testing the limits of human will and maintaining one's humanity under harsh conditions.
Fury (2014)
Pretty awful, predictable and full of clichés to boot.
So based on the IMDb score I had fairly high hopes for this film, in addition to the fact it has some very nice actors in there who have proved their mettle. I was expecting a 7,5-8,0 and what I got felt more like 6,0 out of 10.
Warning, spoiler alerts!
This film has some terribly poor shot scenes that show off Hollywood's preference to "action" and "drama" rather than toning it down a bit and thus creating some actual suspense (Check out Das Boot for example if you want to see how it should have been done in terms of building suspense and character development).
I was literally laughing at my TV when the scene came along where Brad Pitt's brigade has to attack At cannons through an open field:
1. Why not flank them? Well, because Shermans were so well known for their fantastic frontal armour so those shots will bounce right off for right? And sure we have no intel on what they have for weaponry or numbers but I'm sure their calibre and skill of the crew will be so feeble that they will LITERALLY miss 3-4 shots fired straight at a bunch of Sherman tanks actually moving at walking speed.
Because obviously German AT crews firing AP shells from cover would surely miss multiple times at a distance of a only a few 100 yards with a precision engineered high powered antitank cannon. That's way beyond suspending of disbelief here.
2. The scene that really killed the film for me is the part where they get into a house with the 2 German women and they have a dinner. That part was actually nice, where Brad Pitt's character actually tries to get a bit of the normal world back among the madness of war. But the following scene just shouts Hollywood's misunderstanding of what drama is all over it. Way before the mortar barrage starts I was already telling myself 'If I was a really BAD scriptwriter I'd have an enemy counter attack hitting the village right when they come out and of course a stray shell utterly destroys the building they were just in killing the women they had just sort of bonded with.' And so it happened.
Clever scriptwriting and dramatic impact? No, Hollywood "geniuses", that's just called playing the 'Lazy Captain Obvious' card.
The film had potential but stuff such as described above just killed it, well that and all the usual clichés:
- Rookie joining an experienced crew - Rookie gets pushed around a lot - Rookie eventually somehow proves himself - The guys on the Fury tank are mostly just the standard stereotypes (preachy kind of guy, redneck hillbilly) and we're supposed to accept what they do and care about them because they've been through rough times. The only 2 interesting characters are Brad Pitt and the rookie, the rest is utterly forgettable/interchangeable. - The German soldiers are all either nameless thugs (Well safe for 1 scene) or just purely evil and can be shot without something like a trial even though they're unarmed and have surrendered (Private Ryan did so much better a job about what war does to people and how soldiers try to preserve their humanity (think about the final scene of that film).
Such a letdown.
Knight Rider (2008)
American series-making at its worst?
I just watched an episode of the Knight Rider 2008-series and after about 10 min I couldn't help but laugh while at the same time trying to suppress the pain in my brains.
This show has so many glaringly obvious problems. I love the old show and although it also had the occasional badly or cheesy written episode it always did it with heart. You cared about Bonny and Devon and you liked them as characters.
The new show: 1. Poor script writing with characters dropping in and out in ways that make it nearly impossible to suspend disbelief as well as loopholes in the script so big even KITT couldn't turbo-boost over them.
2. Very! poor dramatic implementation of dialogue. Example: Michael and his esteemed colleague are in KITT while napalm heats up the car to the point where they'll either die of overheating or running out of oxygen. Does the scriptwriter try to convey the panic of that moment? Not at all. Instead, we are "treated" with smug comments from totally irrelevant "team" members whose only job seems to be making said smug comments instead of actually energetically working out a plan to save their lives from getting snuffed out.
This could be mistaken for tongue in cheek comedy but in my eyes its just a sign of inadequacy.
3. Over the top reliance of the director on fast camera movements and CGI effects to past it all together. Seriously, after watching the show for 15 min my eyes were basically hurting. It's like they were trying to make a 45 min long videoclip instead of reserving the fast-paced action shots for when it really mattered: the action scenes.
And what is it with US film/series makers and their ill-conceived ideas about visible lasers in broad daylight in a dust-free environment anyway? I know it's supposed to be a semi-scifi show but really they should give the people in the US film industry a speed course in basic physics.
4. Totally irrelevant characters. It's great one geek has 6 Phds in advanced sciences and its equally great another character can speak 9 languages but despite all of these "assets" they're totally irrelevant to the show and more a nuisance than anything else.
The end result? I give it 4 for effort but for the rest they failed miserably. And that's even without knocking the developers on the head for the blatant "lets do some product placement for Ford" kind of thing.
The Point Men (2001)
Mmmmm.....mmmmm
After watching it yesterday I basically have a mixed feeling about this film. The piece has a strong start with a chase and some action which looks gritty and not all "over the top" like in most action films, so that's a good thing. There are moments when the action displayed in this film, like shootouts and car chases, looks surprisingly realistic.
However the film is plagued by too many plot holes and moments where the viewer is treated like a brainless observer. Just some examples:
*Possible spoilers*
1. After the guy who went back to the USA to study gets shot in a store by the main baddie they bury him back in Israel. Directly after the funeral Christopher Lambert and the blonde woman talk in the car about how excited they are that she acquired a job at an embassy in Greece.
Their best friend just died horribly, they buried him and seconds later it's all "lets be happy together again and oh did I already tell you I have a new job"? No normal person would respond in this manner.
2. When the main bad guy goes to Israel to pick up the hardware, that he needs for the final hit, at an old man's workshop he gets attacked by some Palestine kids. Seconds after they start throwing stones 3 Israeli soldiers race around the corner, down the street and "liberate" him.
3. The old military guy in charge of the whole operation is your stereotypical hard ass who doesn't use his common sense. "Oh sure we just lost 3 members of a top secret strike force in a row but he they are probably all accidents anyway so no reason to be alarmed".
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Basically the film has too many of such plot holes and moments where the viewer is asked to suspend disbelief. It's also heavily focused on the Israeli point of view, with little room for a more balanced point of view where both sides of the political spectrum are brought into view.