A Real Stinker of a Movie

Rating: 2/10 (25 June 2007)

My wife and I saw this movie in a theater on its 2004 release. I can only surmise that we slept through it, because renting the DVD this week for a second viewing was a HUGE mistake! What an awful movie! First, as commented upon elsewhere here, director Greengrass must have had a nerve problem because the camera is whipped around so fast for any scene where the characters are actually moving as to make it almost unintelligible as to what is occurring. What was he thinking? This is NOT the way to film a motion picture. The characters and the cars, etc. are supposed to do the moving, not the camera! Second, the writing was pitiful. Did Matt Damon ever utter more than three sentences at a time? There was a plot in there somewhere, but the writing was so poor that nothing any of the characters said did much to advance that "plot." An hour into the story you were still wondering "what is going on here?" And soon that changed to, "I really don't care what is going on here." Pick up the pace guys, this is supposed to be an action/thriller movie, not a sleepwalk! Third, the cinematography was extremely underlit for every indoor scene. This is NOT a film noir, yet it was lit as if it were one. No matter how I massaged my TV and DVD video controls, the indoor scenes seemed as if they were shot in a coal mine. You combine that with the camera whipping around and you wonder how Paul Greengrass ever escaped television directing, let alone do something as acclaimed as United 93.
This is one of the most disappointing "big name" movies I can recall. Avoid it like the plague!