Hey folks, Harry here.... This movie sort of came out of nowhere all sudden like. I remember the night the trailer showed up over at Apple, Moriarty said to me as he was watching it... "This movie doesn't exist, I've never heard of it, how can it exist?" I told the old man that he lives in the sewers of Los Angeles and needed to see what was going on in the world around him, for I had heard of it... Just hadn't heard much... Well now we have the premiere from the Coronado Island Naval Base. And the word is quite good apparently. Of course isn't it impossible to HATE a movie with Owen Wilson? He's just so much fun... As for Gene Hackman, I just watched the FRENCH CONNECTION box set and boy... Why don't we see more movies like that nowadays? Damn that first one is brilliant... and the second one was just completely different... wonderfully surprising. The scene where a drug-addicted and drunk Popeye Doyle is explaining Baseball to a French Detective was one of the most bizarre surreal things I've seen in a long time. Well... Here's Boy Batty with his review...
Hey guys, Boy Batty here,
Last night I attended the world premiere of the new Owen Wilson/ Gene Hackman film Behind Enemy Lines. Given the strong Navy presence in the film, it was screened in San Diego on the Coronado Island Naval Base. Apparently, the ship that the crew did the majority of the filming on (the USS Niminz) is now docked in SD bay.
Most of the audience was made up of Navy people and their families, with the few scattered Fox people, crew people, and local film people (that's why I was there). The screening didn't start until an hour and a half after scheduled, but that wasn't Owen Wilson's fault. He was flown in from LA in an F18. Apparently, it's not enough to pay these people millions. You have to let them do really cool things too.
I wasn't really expecting much from this film. Judging by the trailers, it looked too CGI heavy for my taste. And action films haven't been exactly fulfilling, as of late. It looked to be another plotless, overproduced bore, full of simple effects and no conscious.
Alas! I was happily proven wrong. As a matter of fact, the effects were one of the best things about the movie. The demolitions were top notch. Topped only by the superb miniature work. There is some really exciting jet work in here where all of the cool tricks really come into play. Although the green screen work on their poor man shots (cockpit and parachute stuff) looked a little silly, the rest of the visual effects really came through well. Especially good were the missiles chasing the jet.
I won't get into the plot, because that's not really the important thing to most people going to see a movie like this. Although, this movie does have a pretty decent story to tell. The script has taken a cue from recent movies with a conscious like Three Kings and makes one more aware of the atrocities that are not talked about on CNN. It is structured well enough to make sure that the audience remains tense throughout the film. And, luckily, everyone seemed to chuckle when they were supposed to, cringe when things got gross, and jump when it was scary. So, the writers seemed to do their job well enough. All the Navy folk around us really seemed to enjoy some jokes that were more geared toward poking fun at the attitudes of commanding officers.
The cinematography also used tricks laid down by Three Kings and had quite a bit of color bleaching in certain segments. It was done very well, however, and really made the audience feel the cold of the snow covered forest. All the other modern cinema tricks were used at various times, also. With plenty of handheld stuff when the action got hectic, to lots of extreme close ups and quick cuts when multiple details needed to be shown. A body mount camera was even used in one shot, to show confusion and disorientation. Normally, a shot like that looks out of place outside of an Aronofsky film, but it was so quick here that it was okay. In all, the DP did a fine job of conveying emotion through photography while blending a fine mixture of tricks and traditional work.
To wrap things up, I'd say that this was a thoroughly entertaining film by a director whose work I'm not familiar with (John Moore). Given all the writer's and producers names that were mentioned, this is a really good collaboration. Was this the best film that I've seen this week? No, Taxi Driver and Band of Outsiders are playing in SD, fool. Is it the best Hackman movie I've seen this week? Well, Heist WAS pretty damn good. Was it the best action movie I've seen in a long time, given this summers lackluster offerings? I think so. Will I see it again? If I don't see it in the theatre when it comes out, I'll definitely buy the DVD.
Boy Batty
