Lack of plot, character creativity and quality backfire on 'Shoot 'Em Up'
Good actors gone bad.
Issue date: 9/20/07 Section: Arts & Entertainment
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The fact the character development runs so shallow takes away from a lot of the film and whatever is not drowned by that is destroyed with the dialogue. A lot of it is a series of cliché one-liners and puns at the expense of the killed goons chasing Owen and Belluci. For example, Owen jams a carrot through the back of a mans mouth so that it juts out the back of his skull. This act is skillfully followed by the line "eat your vegetables," setting the pace of the whole movie. It's a series of one-lines similar to that each time someone dies a gruesome or slick death. It feels more like space-filler than dialogue.
Some people call this film an action movie in its most primal senses, others will tell you it's supposed to be a spoof of an action movie, but it feels like neither. If it is either of those, this is what happened: It's an action movie that goes too far beyond the definition of a decent action movie (like the Die Hard series), in that it becomes nothing more than a series of cool scenes strung together. Or, It's a spoof that was trying to be too witty and accurate. Somewhere along the lines, everything just became a convoluted and jumbled mess of a film.
Save your money, go rent Bad Boys, Die Hard, or a Guy Richie flick. I'd recommend Steven Seagal's Hard to Kill over this.
Some people call this film an action movie in its most primal senses, others will tell you it's supposed to be a spoof of an action movie, but it feels like neither. If it is either of those, this is what happened: It's an action movie that goes too far beyond the definition of a decent action movie (like the Die Hard series), in that it becomes nothing more than a series of cool scenes strung together. Or, It's a spoof that was trying to be too witty and accurate. Somewhere along the lines, everything just became a convoluted and jumbled mess of a film.
Save your money, go rent Bad Boys, Die Hard, or a Guy Richie flick. I'd recommend Steven Seagal's Hard to Kill over this.
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