Load of the Crap

Rating: Null/10 (31 May 2004)

A quick review of a few of the problems I found in this film:
1. Boring, unrealistic violence. By unrealistic I don't mean whether someone getting sliced looks real, I mean that there are few consequences for the vast violence. The only wounded we see are the main characters. Where are the screaming soldiers with their intestines hanging out? And where are the medics trying to help them? It's all basically a cartoon, and a not very interesting one at that.
2. Good versus evil. Haven't we had enough of this B.S. ? When in human history have the enemies been all bad, and the opponents all good? There's no complexity, and in the end it justifies genocide. All the opponents are made to look like horrible human mutations so we don't feel bad slaughtering them. It had me rooting for Sauron.
3. Lord of the white guys. How come "mankind" gets to be all white? And the King in the end looks like he could jump right into the lead role of Mel Gibson's latest film.
4. Slow, lingering shots of overblown seriousness, combined with annoyingly cheesy "light" moments. You've seen it all before in countless B movies.