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ljpliceaseI like to write down my thoughts about movies right after seeing them so that I can catalog my first impressions of each movie that I see. This time I slept on it, so I've had a good night's sleep to reflect on it.
Overall I enjoyed this film.
Most of the performances were pretty terrible, and the worst of the bunch came from Jessica Alba. The delivery of the opening was abysmal. I've decided this is actually fairly forgivable, and perhaps even appropriate, given that the actors are delivering cheesy comic book lines. I thought the strongest characters were Bruce Willis as Hardigan and Mickey Rourke as Marv. I thought that Elijah Wood's character "Kevin" could have been portrayed as well by pure CG, although this is more due to the nature of the character than the actor himself.
I find it interesting that the only female characters who are not treated as objects are a group of deadly prostitutes who defend their turf with machine guns and samurai swords. I wonder what exactly the author is trying to imply.
I liked the look of the film. This really is the only thing that saves this movie. I love the contrasty black and white; I actually think they used a little too much color, although in places it is highly effective. Visually many of the characters are highly memorable. Kevin and Miho (Devon Aoki) were two characters who had no lines at all (that I can remember), but they were visually awesome. The way that Kevin is defeated in the end has to do with a weakness in his attack style, and it is such a central part of the encounter that it is disappointing that it was not foreshadowed better.
The movie is graphically violent, gruesome, and totally unapologetic about it. Even though it is in a "fake" comic book style, I would not recommend it to most people unless I felt pretty confident I knew their tolerances with regard to that.
Overall I enjoyed this film.
Most of the performances were pretty terrible, and the worst of the bunch came from Jessica Alba. The delivery of the opening was abysmal. I've decided this is actually fairly forgivable, and perhaps even appropriate, given that the actors are delivering cheesy comic book lines. I thought the strongest characters were Bruce Willis as Hardigan and Mickey Rourke as Marv. I thought that Elijah Wood's character "Kevin" could have been portrayed as well by pure CG, although this is more due to the nature of the character than the actor himself.
I find it interesting that the only female characters who are not treated as objects are a group of deadly prostitutes who defend their turf with machine guns and samurai swords. I wonder what exactly the author is trying to imply.
I liked the look of the film. This really is the only thing that saves this movie. I love the contrasty black and white; I actually think they used a little too much color, although in places it is highly effective. Visually many of the characters are highly memorable. Kevin and Miho (Devon Aoki) were two characters who had no lines at all (that I can remember), but they were visually awesome. The way that Kevin is defeated in the end has to do with a weakness in his attack style, and it is such a central part of the encounter that it is disappointing that it was not foreshadowed better.
The movie is graphically violent, gruesome, and totally unapologetic about it. Even though it is in a "fake" comic book style, I would not recommend it to most people unless I felt pretty confident I knew their tolerances with regard to that.
