What were they thinking?

Rating: 1/10 (3 May 2009)

I had been looking forward to seeing this at the IMAX for so long. Maybe that made it all the more disappointing, but it's honestly one of the worst films I've seen for a long time. If it was supposed to be a sarcastic parody that makes fun of the juvenile fantasies of sad 15 year old computer geeks, it worked - but I don't think it was. Like most people who've not read the book, I hadn't got a clue what was going on by about halfway through, but since that was after nearly 90 minutes, I didn't really care any more either. I am quite a fan of both cheesy sci-fi (eg. Brazil, Bladerunner, Total recall) and some gritty action (No country for old men, Fight club), but it didn't work on either level. The sci-fi elements were very visually appealing, but emotionless, and the action sequences were some of the most disturbing things I have ever seen on film; apart from the gross-out splatter of dismembering and various executions (can just about deal with that) it was in particular the close-up slow-mo shots of a man hitting a woman very very hard in the face that I couldn't watch. I'm afraid I couldn't see any justification for it in terms of character development - there were plenty of other examples they showed of just how much of a head-case this "Comedian" is. Showing that level of violence against women is going to mess with those young boys' heads!
Having said all that, the film did have amazing visuals which make it worth watching on DVD (you can make dinner to get through the boring bits), some really hilarious sex scenes, a nice but totally underdeveloped love story and an interesting political subtext.