Good, but...

Rating: 1/10 (4 July 1999)

I side with the negative crowd on this one; with the risk of sounding pompous I have to say this: To believe that this is a brilliant film suggest a low level of education and an underdeveloped personal philosophy. There, I've said it. To question the realness of reality is a 400-year old Cartesian idea. Actually, it was explored more interestingly in the old Star Trek episode "Spectre of the Gun" in 1969. The rest of the film is an obvious rip-off of "The Terminator" and all of John Woo, which are far more interesting movies. The film ponders too long on the central premise, and there isn't enough action to make it a good action movie, either. Still, overall production design is great, but the acting is wooden, and Fishburne makes for an unconvincing guru. All the good scenes were revealed in the trailer, so there's not much else to do than just sit in the theatre and feel patronized by the whole thing. At least, that's what I did. The whole thing just isn't half as clever and original as it wants to be.