Most exciting movie of year... but best?

Rating: 5/10 (19 October 1999)

I totally agree with all critics and comments here that laud the film for being exciting, both in terms of acting and cinematography. I also have no problems with the excessive violence. But I have a lot of issues with it's content: that women are portrayed as non-existent (save, of course, for what amounts to an emotional whore); that "men" alone are supposedly oppressed and confined by our society, as though they alone miss the action and challenge of the past; that social change here equals destruction, and not construction. Things can be dismantled and improved without violence and destruction, and this film leaves no room for that fact of life. I was also totally baffled by the comment about their being men "who are babies, children, a generation raised by women." Which generation WASN'T raised by women? And what does that have to do with their rage? Why wouldn't that make them, and not their sisters or fathers, angry too? I'd appreciate input on that. In addition, I think a lot of people who see this movie are not mature/intelligent enough to realize that for all the violence, that's not the only point of the movie, that there is more to it both cinematically and philosophically than beating people up. And it scares me that those people will take the wrong impression with them. NOT that this movie, or other violent movies shouldn't be released--it's just a shame that ignorant people will read them incorrectly...