|
Buy Radiohead tickets,
Coachella Festival tickets,
Kanye West tickets,
Tom Petty tickets,
Rascal Flatts tickets,
and loads more
concert tickets right here!
|
Pete Travis, Vantage Point
02/26/2008 A couple of months ago I commented on how We Own The Night seemed like it was the first draft of what could become a great movie. Now, here it is in the second month of 2008, and I’m feeling much the same way about Vantage Point. The ingredients are all here for a remarkable film, but they never come together to form something worthwhile. Why do so many films with such great potential feel rushed? The story is about a plot to assassinate President Ashton (William Hurt) at an anti-terrorism summit in Salamanca, Spain. After he is shot, the film goes back and forth through time, recounting the experience from different perspectives. These points of view include Thomas Barnes (Dennis Quaid), a veteran member of the Secret Service; Kent Taylor (Matthew Fox), an agent assigned to his first mission; and Howard Lewis (Forest Whitaker), a man vacationing from the U.S. after separating from his wife. For the press, the filmmakers are giving a lot of lip service to Akira Kurosawa’s Rashomon (1950), which featured flashbacks recounting the horrific death of a samurai’s wife. Of course, the comparison is almost missing the point, since what made Rashomon so revolutionary was that the flashbacks did not always tell the truth. However, director Pete Travis is no Kurosawa, and Vantage Point lacks the classic film’s discipline. Instead of being illuminating, the different perspectives alternate between being frustrating, repetitive, or downright boring. Though the poster and advertisements promise “8 Points of View, 1 Truth,” Vantage Point drops the multiple-perspective gimmick after six. What is disappointing is that the film does not have the tenacity to carry on with the gimmick. Instead, it degenerates into a sub-Bourne Ultimatum chase flick where there are plenty of car crashes and double-crosses, but not much tension. The plot threads culminate with a car chase that is overlong and incoherent. Don’t get me wrong. Action pieces are great. Sometimes they are the sole reason for going to a movie. However, what we are presented with in Vantage Point is simply filler. Unwilling to delve further into its premise, the film mistakes action scenes for dramatic pay-off. For minutes on end we get Barnes driving through implausibly-vacant streets. Sure, cars collide, but nobody is hurt until the plot require them to be. There are many good things here, but Vantage Point cannot coast on the strength of a strong cast and central premise. With multiplexes being more crowded than ever, it is not enough to rely on smoke and mirrors. You have to execute your premise well in order to win audiences over. For a modern example, take Memento (2001). It has a great hook (the story is told in backwards-chronology), but Christopher Nolan’s writing and direction are also equally strong. A test for a movie like this should be your willingness to watch it again, to pick up on the little things you may have missed the first time. Here’s a small test for those of who you have seen Vantage Point: do you feel the urge to see it twice? Comments [post a comment] |
|
Thursday, July 03, 2008
Weather: Fair, 91°
Weather: Fair, 91°
Post a Comment
E-mail To A Friend
Join The List
Technorati Tags
Vantage Point Assassination Cinema Review;