.......starring Ewan McGregor and Scarlett Johansson and thought it was OK.
But I saw ways it could have been a whole lot better.
What began with an interesting set up and an initial storyline seemingly fraught with both nuance and thought-provoking science fiction, gradually degenerated into a simplistic confusion of repetitive chase scenes, well-staged multiple car crashes, Hollywood gunplay clichés and the demolition of various buildings.
It was actually quite entertaining and full of action, but it could have been so much more.
Spoilers ahead:
The basic premise of this movie from "fire in the hole," "shoot 'em up, bang, bang" director Michael Bay seemed quite promising and, for about half its length, I was totally drawn in and eager for the rest of the story.
I was reminded of such enjoyable older movies as the ambitiously futuristic “Logan’s Run” (1976) starring Michael York and Jenny Agutter, John Frankenheimer’s imaginative, dramatic mystery/thriller “Seconds” (1966), which featured Rock Hudson in perhaps his very best performance, and “Coma” (1978), a chilling medical thriller directed by Michael Crichton from Robin Cook’s novel, starring Genevieve Bujold and Michael Douglas.
All these flicks were also about the secret recycling of body parts and the suspenseful development of that plot device alone was more than enough to keep them exciting and ethically entertaining without unleavened onscreen mayhem worthy of “Die Hard,” “The Terminator” or even the latest “Star Wars” episode.
There is a market and a need for all kinds of movies and this was certainly a partially good one.
But when this film, at about the midpoint, increasingly took a route primarily featuring special effects rather than interaction between the main characters, I began to lose interest.
In the recent “War of the Worlds,” I really liked everything right up until that last sappy reunification scene.
I would have been more satisfied had the son/brother been left to rest in peace and if just a bit more screen time and one close up had been allotted to the grandparents, who were played by those actors that were the protagonists in the 1953 movie.
Why did Steven Spielberg even bother to have Gene Barry and Ann Robinson in his cast at all, when their cameo was so short and from such long distance that they go unrecognized?
In “The Island,” McGregor and Johannson play escaping clones, emotional and intellectual "children" on the lam in a strange and adult brave new world.
They run and they hide, they dodge bullets and they learn to survive, but, for my taste, too little cinematic notice is taken of their characters or their interactions after the explosions start and black helicopters fill the sky.
Take away some of the redundant, fiery, special effects and give me more and hotter fireworks in the sack, when Ewan and Scarlett are discovering and exploring their newfound sexuality.
Pretty please???
There were a few well-done bits about learning new meanings of life and language, so let's have more of that and cut back on a few scenes where they were running down long tunnels.
I’ll even credit the clever and entertaining “Shaun of the Dead” for delivering more from a one trick pony and a shopworn plot than this flick did.
Here, IMHO, two good and attractive actors with well-developed bodies, portraying interesting characters with rapidly developing minds, are too much wasted in the end, doing little more than playing predictable hide and seek with all the bad guys.
I thought this was an acceptable action movie, but rather poor use of both Scarlett Johansson's smokin' body and a potentially better realized science fiction/dramatic storyline.
See it expecting nothing more and you won’t be as disappointed as I was.
Yeah, it was an OK Michael Bay movie, but watching the first half had me hoping for more in the second.
And I thought all these genre-matching films were better in some and/or various ways:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0074812/
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0060955/
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077355/
Gig 'em, FAST FRED '65.
Before the world wide web, village idiots usually stayed in their own village.
[This message has been edited by FAST FRED (edited 7/26/2005 12:23p).]
But I saw ways it could have been a whole lot better.
What began with an interesting set up and an initial storyline seemingly fraught with both nuance and thought-provoking science fiction, gradually degenerated into a simplistic confusion of repetitive chase scenes, well-staged multiple car crashes, Hollywood gunplay clichés and the demolition of various buildings.
It was actually quite entertaining and full of action, but it could have been so much more.
Spoilers ahead:
The basic premise of this movie from "fire in the hole," "shoot 'em up, bang, bang" director Michael Bay seemed quite promising and, for about half its length, I was totally drawn in and eager for the rest of the story.
I was reminded of such enjoyable older movies as the ambitiously futuristic “Logan’s Run” (1976) starring Michael York and Jenny Agutter, John Frankenheimer’s imaginative, dramatic mystery/thriller “Seconds” (1966), which featured Rock Hudson in perhaps his very best performance, and “Coma” (1978), a chilling medical thriller directed by Michael Crichton from Robin Cook’s novel, starring Genevieve Bujold and Michael Douglas.
All these flicks were also about the secret recycling of body parts and the suspenseful development of that plot device alone was more than enough to keep them exciting and ethically entertaining without unleavened onscreen mayhem worthy of “Die Hard,” “The Terminator” or even the latest “Star Wars” episode.
There is a market and a need for all kinds of movies and this was certainly a partially good one.
But when this film, at about the midpoint, increasingly took a route primarily featuring special effects rather than interaction between the main characters, I began to lose interest.
In the recent “War of the Worlds,” I really liked everything right up until that last sappy reunification scene.
I would have been more satisfied had the son/brother been left to rest in peace and if just a bit more screen time and one close up had been allotted to the grandparents, who were played by those actors that were the protagonists in the 1953 movie.
Why did Steven Spielberg even bother to have Gene Barry and Ann Robinson in his cast at all, when their cameo was so short and from such long distance that they go unrecognized?
In “The Island,” McGregor and Johannson play escaping clones, emotional and intellectual "children" on the lam in a strange and adult brave new world.
They run and they hide, they dodge bullets and they learn to survive, but, for my taste, too little cinematic notice is taken of their characters or their interactions after the explosions start and black helicopters fill the sky.
Take away some of the redundant, fiery, special effects and give me more and hotter fireworks in the sack, when Ewan and Scarlett are discovering and exploring their newfound sexuality.
Pretty please???
There were a few well-done bits about learning new meanings of life and language, so let's have more of that and cut back on a few scenes where they were running down long tunnels.
I’ll even credit the clever and entertaining “Shaun of the Dead” for delivering more from a one trick pony and a shopworn plot than this flick did.
Here, IMHO, two good and attractive actors with well-developed bodies, portraying interesting characters with rapidly developing minds, are too much wasted in the end, doing little more than playing predictable hide and seek with all the bad guys.
I thought this was an acceptable action movie, but rather poor use of both Scarlett Johansson's smokin' body and a potentially better realized science fiction/dramatic storyline.
See it expecting nothing more and you won’t be as disappointed as I was.
Yeah, it was an OK Michael Bay movie, but watching the first half had me hoping for more in the second.
And I thought all these genre-matching films were better in some and/or various ways:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0074812/
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0060955/
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077355/
Gig 'em, FAST FRED '65.
Before the world wide web, village idiots usually stayed in their own village.
[This message has been edited by FAST FRED (edited 7/26/2005 12:23p).]
