Post by Ben on Sept 6, 2015 19:32:43 GMT 2
I was checking up on some of my Amazon reviews this morning and thought it appropriate to share with you guys the thrashing I gave Pompeii last winter. If you've seen it too, I pity you.
The review:
"There were horses, and a man on fire!"
Who knew when Brick Tamland uttered that iconic phrase 10 years ago he was prophetically describing in detail the cataclysmic mess that is 2014's Pompeii. Of course, I knew it was going to be bad- I remember seeing the trailer and wondering aloud "who GOES to these movies?"- but I had no idea Pompeii was going to be the colossal stain on the entire genre of overblown-CGI-action-films that it is.
Which, in itself, is saying quite a lot.
I must admit, I am struggling to pick a single place to begin explaining just how dreadful Pompeii is. What went wrong? Where did it fly off the tracks? The answers, respectively, are "everything" and "when I pushed play."
We are introduced to the hero, a young Celt named Milo (come on, really? "Milo?" In 62 A.D.? I suppose he's the son of Todd and brother of Jerry too, huh?), on the night his parents are murdered. Milo is subsequently sold into slavery, becomes a gladiator, kills people with comic book flair, and because of his skill in the arena, is sent south to Pompeii to play with the big boys. ("Why Pompeii? Why not Rome?" I was wondering the same thing myself, Reader.)
On his way to Pompeii Milo encounters a horse that has fallen in the mud (it rears up and falls over for no apparent reason). This is when he first meets Cassia, the love interest, played by Emily Browning. Now, I normally find Ms. Browning to be fairly attractive, but she looks uncharacteristically disproportionate in her introductory scene: her cheeks appear to be stuffed with cotton, and her forehead is as big as Mt. Vesuvius itself.
As if ruining Emily Browning's face is not distracting enough, the audience now learns that Milo possesses the power to speak to horses. Are you intrigued, Reader? Because Cassia is, and she watches carefully as Milo approaches the fallen animal and proceeds to... break its neck with a sharp twist of his hands!
Everyone is rightfully appalled- everyone except Cassia. She turns to her friend (among the offended) and remarks how kind it was of Milo to end the creature. Apparently nothing says "true love" like snuffing the life out of a slightly injured 1500-pound animal with your bare hands in front of the woman of your dreams. Never mind that the beast probably just needed to be helped back to its feet.
The story certainly doesn't get any more original along the way- Milo has trouble making friends with the other gladiators, the man who killed his family is in town, there are problems with the love interest that killing more horses won't solve, etc.- and some of the dialogue is guffaw-worthy. I tried to keep track of all the stock tough-guy phrases used by various gladiators and guards (Exhibit A: "No savage could ever be a match for ROME!!!") during Pompeii, but I would have ended up copying the entire script verbatim.
Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje's character, Atticus, is the worst offender in this regard. Everything he says is a short, two-part punchline (Exhibit B: "You've earned your reputation... but not fighting a gladiator like ME!"), and he speaks so slowly I couldn't tell if the director was instructing him to go for a Tough-Guy-Who's-Taken-Too-Many-Blows-to-the-Head approach or full-blown mental-retard a la Switowski in the remake of The Longest Yard. Rest assured, this was not the actor's fault.
Indeed, the easiest target of all is Kiefer Sutherland (who plays the resident Bad Guy), an otherwise talented actor who deserves the Razzie nomination this film earned him. No doubt he, too, received poor direction. After all, he was not the only one to turn in a performance worthy only of eye-rolls and jeers; every character was bursting with cheesy dialogue and melodrama. (Seriously, how many times does Cassia have that constipated look of distress on her face when Milo is- *gasp*- in danger?)
The one feature of Pompeii that should have been redeeming is the CGI, yet apart from Vesuvius itself, it's nothing less than horrendous.
No joke, the CGI arena behind the big gladiatorial battle looked like something out of an early 2000s sports video game- two dimensional people with arms cheering in slow motion. There are many more CGI offenses during the actual battle which, I should mention, included the cheesiest fight choreography to ever hit the screen outside of a Steven Seagal film. One soldier even- get this- slashes a spear in half out of midair with a sword. Is this Dynasty Warriors, or a blockbuster mega-film?
Of course, I was still holding onto a shred of hope that once Vesuvius erupted in all its fiery glory Pompeii might actually get a little bit better, but that only led to more disappointment. I read that volcanologists largely applauded the filmmakers for depicting a realistic volcanic eruption, which is funny considering most of the on-screen destruction is caused by burning volcanic asteroids raining down on Pompeii (which is only problematic because, well, a real volcanic eruption does not include burning asteroids).
Incredibly, amidst the chaos of a VOLCANIC SUPER ERUPTION characters still find the time to run from one end of Pompeii to the other, attempt to board ships, run back across the city once those leave, search for their dead relatives, track down and kill old rivals, and... well, you get it. All the while everyone else is burning. Cue Brick Tamland.
Every time you think Pompeii just cannot possibly get any more absurd or corny, it blows you away with yet another awful line from the egregious script or, near the end, a chase scene on horseback through the volcanic eruption. (Yeah, it happened.) If there is anything good to be said for Pompeii at all, it's that the filmmakers actually had the guts to end it the right way. Obviously, I am referring to the fact that-
**SPOILER ALERT**
Everyone dies. In the words of Megadeth: "No survivors! Set the world AFIIIIIIIRE!"
And don't see this movie.
The review:
"There were horses, and a man on fire!"
Who knew when Brick Tamland uttered that iconic phrase 10 years ago he was prophetically describing in detail the cataclysmic mess that is 2014's Pompeii. Of course, I knew it was going to be bad- I remember seeing the trailer and wondering aloud "who GOES to these movies?"- but I had no idea Pompeii was going to be the colossal stain on the entire genre of overblown-CGI-action-films that it is.
Which, in itself, is saying quite a lot.
I must admit, I am struggling to pick a single place to begin explaining just how dreadful Pompeii is. What went wrong? Where did it fly off the tracks? The answers, respectively, are "everything" and "when I pushed play."
We are introduced to the hero, a young Celt named Milo (come on, really? "Milo?" In 62 A.D.? I suppose he's the son of Todd and brother of Jerry too, huh?), on the night his parents are murdered. Milo is subsequently sold into slavery, becomes a gladiator, kills people with comic book flair, and because of his skill in the arena, is sent south to Pompeii to play with the big boys. ("Why Pompeii? Why not Rome?" I was wondering the same thing myself, Reader.)
On his way to Pompeii Milo encounters a horse that has fallen in the mud (it rears up and falls over for no apparent reason). This is when he first meets Cassia, the love interest, played by Emily Browning. Now, I normally find Ms. Browning to be fairly attractive, but she looks uncharacteristically disproportionate in her introductory scene: her cheeks appear to be stuffed with cotton, and her forehead is as big as Mt. Vesuvius itself.
As if ruining Emily Browning's face is not distracting enough, the audience now learns that Milo possesses the power to speak to horses. Are you intrigued, Reader? Because Cassia is, and she watches carefully as Milo approaches the fallen animal and proceeds to... break its neck with a sharp twist of his hands!
Everyone is rightfully appalled- everyone except Cassia. She turns to her friend (among the offended) and remarks how kind it was of Milo to end the creature. Apparently nothing says "true love" like snuffing the life out of a slightly injured 1500-pound animal with your bare hands in front of the woman of your dreams. Never mind that the beast probably just needed to be helped back to its feet.
The story certainly doesn't get any more original along the way- Milo has trouble making friends with the other gladiators, the man who killed his family is in town, there are problems with the love interest that killing more horses won't solve, etc.- and some of the dialogue is guffaw-worthy. I tried to keep track of all the stock tough-guy phrases used by various gladiators and guards (Exhibit A: "No savage could ever be a match for ROME!!!") during Pompeii, but I would have ended up copying the entire script verbatim.
Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje's character, Atticus, is the worst offender in this regard. Everything he says is a short, two-part punchline (Exhibit B: "You've earned your reputation... but not fighting a gladiator like ME!"), and he speaks so slowly I couldn't tell if the director was instructing him to go for a Tough-Guy-Who's-Taken-Too-Many-Blows-to-the-Head approach or full-blown mental-retard a la Switowski in the remake of The Longest Yard. Rest assured, this was not the actor's fault.
Indeed, the easiest target of all is Kiefer Sutherland (who plays the resident Bad Guy), an otherwise talented actor who deserves the Razzie nomination this film earned him. No doubt he, too, received poor direction. After all, he was not the only one to turn in a performance worthy only of eye-rolls and jeers; every character was bursting with cheesy dialogue and melodrama. (Seriously, how many times does Cassia have that constipated look of distress on her face when Milo is- *gasp*- in danger?)
The one feature of Pompeii that should have been redeeming is the CGI, yet apart from Vesuvius itself, it's nothing less than horrendous.
No joke, the CGI arena behind the big gladiatorial battle looked like something out of an early 2000s sports video game- two dimensional people with arms cheering in slow motion. There are many more CGI offenses during the actual battle which, I should mention, included the cheesiest fight choreography to ever hit the screen outside of a Steven Seagal film. One soldier even- get this- slashes a spear in half out of midair with a sword. Is this Dynasty Warriors, or a blockbuster mega-film?
Of course, I was still holding onto a shred of hope that once Vesuvius erupted in all its fiery glory Pompeii might actually get a little bit better, but that only led to more disappointment. I read that volcanologists largely applauded the filmmakers for depicting a realistic volcanic eruption, which is funny considering most of the on-screen destruction is caused by burning volcanic asteroids raining down on Pompeii (which is only problematic because, well, a real volcanic eruption does not include burning asteroids).
Incredibly, amidst the chaos of a VOLCANIC SUPER ERUPTION characters still find the time to run from one end of Pompeii to the other, attempt to board ships, run back across the city once those leave, search for their dead relatives, track down and kill old rivals, and... well, you get it. All the while everyone else is burning. Cue Brick Tamland.
Every time you think Pompeii just cannot possibly get any more absurd or corny, it blows you away with yet another awful line from the egregious script or, near the end, a chase scene on horseback through the volcanic eruption. (Yeah, it happened.) If there is anything good to be said for Pompeii at all, it's that the filmmakers actually had the guts to end it the right way. Obviously, I am referring to the fact that-
**SPOILER ALERT**
Everyone dies. In the words of Megadeth: "No survivors! Set the world AFIIIIIIIRE!"
And don't see this movie.
