Great flick until the last few minutes

Rating: 6/10 (10 October 2007)

I really liked "Deja Vu" until the last few minutes (more on that later). The acting (Denzel Washington, Val Kilmer, etc.) was great as you'd expect. The story was creative and very different, in a good way - a totally different perspective than anything I've seen or read before. Special effects were good and surprisingly fewer that I'd have expected (or at least that I noticed).
Basically, *everything* about "Deja Vu" was brilliant until (drum roll please) the last few minutes. Then, all of a sudden, all good deeds were undone - and exponentially so, to boot. *Everything* good, all the way from the writers to the director to the actors, to the towel boys etc. it was all simply obliterated in a few brief minutes with a really lame and poorly executed ending that wasn't fitting to end a pre-schooler's first film (sorry if I insulted any pre-schoolers). I was just *so* disappointed in the ending that only writings the size of an epic novel would fill my despair. I'll give only one example - so I don't spoil anything. And that is... Since when can a blazer type vehicle get from 0 to "flip over at spectacularly *high* speed" in about a 5 foot distance? This is just one of a multitude of sins we observed in the final minutes of "Deja Vu". Many other, more serious flaws can't be mentioned without introducing possible spoilers.
Seriously, I loved the movie until very close to the end. I would have debated between a 7 and maybe a 9 out of 10. But the ending was so poorly conceived (did I say that? - it was never conceived, they just took some old "Dukes of Hazzard" footage or something like that and used it - sorry "Dukes of Hazzard" fans, no foul intended) after a brilliant first 100+ minutes of film, that I just couldn't give it better than a 6, and I wanted to give it even less, I was so mad.
My bottom line final thoughts - I just can't get over a movie being so brilliantly conceived and executed by so many people. And then at the very end, everyone said "hey this has worked in other lame movies". Did they not understand what they had created? It was genius up until the ending. I really believe that whoever was involved with the first 100+ minutes of the movie plot/storyline must have had absolutely no involvement in the last 10 minutes or so of the movie.
The ending was a disgrace! But the overall movie was a success!