brainless, waste of a great opportunity and resources

Rating: 2/10 (2 February 2008)

Really, whatever awe the SFX might cause, this reflects what Hollywood thinks of the public, and how easily the public rewards the brainlessness with which it is treated. Pathetic new low for Jon Voight and John Turturro "performances".
The studio, producers, Hasbro, the "director", and cast must have been thinking of all the money they would make, so they played "safe". Why risk the franchise with a more intelligent and adventurous movie? They just chose cheap, C-rate actors, and an idiotic plot with cheesy lines. Little wonder that striking writers complain, in part, that the movie and TV industry only demands cheap crap for unthinking public, to just squeeze their money out. Thinking people seem to be dangerous (reminds me of the USSR).
Pitifully, the mainstream public will just reward these resource-and-opportunity waster "moviemakers". People will smile and swing happy, salivating tongues. Didn't Batman Begins set a precedent on how you can make a great movie and "restart" a franchise that appeared to have been killed by their own greedy owners in the 80's and 90's? Are we sinking back to the idiotic era of Hollywood?