12 Rounds has been out for a quite a while but I finally got a chance to see it at my friends place, thought would be a good idea to throw together a quick review.
Ok I put my hands up ! guilty as charged I’m a bit of a sucker for Renny Harlin movies, there I said it and I’m not ashamed… yes he did make arguably one of the worst pirate movies ever made “Cutthroat Island” followed by “Long Kiss Goodnight”. But lets not forget he also made Die Hard 2 and Cliffhanger both good solid action driven movies, oh and I almost forgot Mindhunters great movie very atmospheric, fair go to the producers to put money into the following formula
Christian Slater + Val Kilmer + Renny Harlin = Good Movie
who would have thought it.
Back to the review, 12 rounds has all the hallmarks (hate that bloody word) of a well paced flick, there’s action a plenty and its well paced there some nice stunts and and an ok story if your not familiar with Die Hard III it follows in the same vein.
Cop pisses of nutty bomber, nutty bomber returns with a vengenance gets cop to jump through hoops to save kidnapped wife but wait theres a twist in the tale (a bit obvious) and thats it, entertaing and dumb but not boring.
One more thing I should mention John Cena CANNNOT ACT !!! he’s Ok jumping around doing his WWE tricks but in the more dramatic scenes he’s pretty hopeless. Just though I mentioned that just to piss off any Cena fans !
Hulkamania rules !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Just got back from a viewing on the new terminator movie “Terminator Salvation” or Terminator 4 (which I think is a much better title, less pretentious).
Anyhow, the movie kicks off in modern day when a convict slated for execution is asked by a cancer suffering Helena Bonham Carter to donate his body to something or other (was getting a bit bored at this stage to be honest).
Then I went out for a toilet break and when I came back the scene had changed and there was good old Bruce Wayne (Christian Bale) rappelling down into a research facility blowing everything up (YES!!! finally !!! ).
I could go into a more detailed review revealing the plot and all, but that would be a waste a time if your a die-hard Terminator fan like me. Suffice it to say a lot of cyborgs get shot, Arnie makes a brief cameo and lots of cyberdyne toys come out and play. The effects I found were Ok, it didnt blow me a away to be honest and one thing that really annoyed me was that most of the action took place during the day and this ruined the technoir finish of the previous Terminator movies.
The acting for the most part was Ok but I thought Christian Bale portrayal of John Connor lacking any real emotion, dont get me wrong he dotted the t’s and crossed the I’s but he had such an opportuniy to bring something different but he pulled up short.
Final verdict :
Good popcorn movie leave brain at door, lots of cgi unfortunately for me nothing original
I saw this masterpiece on the weekend and to cut a long story short it was dreadful even by Mister Bay standards it was an overlong and over blown mess.
If you have 150 mins to waste…DONT !!! do something constructive, please go find a new pastime like bear wrestling or monster truck racing. The only AND I MEAN THE ONLY good thing about this movie is the special FX (and maybe Megan Fox when she’s not trying to act).