Reviews

I started to watch this one as the trailer got my attention. Something around: who knows, maybe it is watchable. Three and a half episodes later I feel disgusted and tricked. If you want just another story about how bad people can react under stress please go ahead. For me this is boring as any other cheap "psychological study" in TV series, an excuse for lack of creativity of the scenario author...

Setting seems original, but only till you get this will be all about cliche characters doing cliche things. No suspense, no mystery, not till this aforementioned three and a half episode. I am too bored and disgusted to wait further...

But there is one more thing... What I find particularly offending is what I didn't know when I started to watch this. That this is in fact another iteration of Jacek Dukaj's "The Old Axolotl"! A great piece of hard science fiction with deep story and brilliant ideas. One of the best books of the genre. What did the Netflix guys got form it though? Just the begining, turned into a flat story of repeating themes and quite unpleasant to watch... Because the emotions rules it all, "no intelligence included".

This is probably the worst film I have ever seen. I tend to be grumpy when films are considered, especially as I'm born and raised true _Sci_-Fi genre fan as well as the Aliens one. So first I tried to find anything in this production worth praising. I failed miserably as the only two good things I could say about it is:

• when you are an idiot on the unknown planet you will die - this is the basic truth you can derive from the story, so it has educational value for future space explorers and preschool children in general,

• I watched the film not in 3D so my head hurt only for other reasons as below.

I'm also very sorry for the actress playing main character as she is several levels of magnitude better than the production as a whole.

There is literally no scene in the entire scenario that has at least a drop of sense. All the story elements seem to come either from cheapest childish comic book, some junior wannabe copywriter sure to make money as he works on such a big franchise he does not understand the least, some dark corners of creators mind full of unexplained fears and deviations, or simply out of the blue... Another thing is nothing works it this world as it is supposed to. Be it technology, human relations, biology, even ol' good gravity - it behaves exactly the way it is needed in a particular scene but does not follow any usually applicable standard rules or logic. The film is also 100% predictable - you will know what will happen at least 15-30 minutes upfront. The part of the scenario, that was probably intended as the biggest suspense, is so obvious the moment it starts that it is just pathetic...

But most of all this film is boring. Boring so much that it is probably the first time in my life I seriously considered leaving the cinema. And already after 30 minutes... I was checking my watch several times during the show, again I think first time in my life. Film is full of long scenes that were possibly intended to be deep and meaningful but ended up as completely unmoving crap. The flow is: nothing new, nothing interesting then some blabbering meant to be philosophical, kind of "the big and eternal questions" one but flat and constantly missing the point, and then someone "suddenly" dies in horror class B full of gore scene that is so predictable you won't even feel a thing. And then its boring again.

Waste of time and I think I won't ever go for Ridley Scott film. Seriously Mr Scott, I respect your previous (previous to Prometheus that is) works so I can only say: please retire...

History is my field of interests. I am in a historical re-enactment society, read quite a lot about the European history etc. This was wrote to point, that I do treat history as an important part of my life. I also like fiction and fantasy literature and I like when there is a solid border between fiction and historical scenarios/books/etc. I particularly despise productions, where “historical costume” is used only as an excuse to tell quite present-day politically correct stories about love and patriotism. And I was really worried this could be such a production especially since it was made “by the order” of Kremlin. But it was not. On the contrary – there is love, there is patriotism, there is pride of being a part of Russian nation and even some political correctness (a little) but all of it is served in the funny, warm and definitely not serious way and not the standard pathetic Hollywood-style. As for the history in the picture it is treated similarly, I mean not to serious. There are historical figures and historical events but they are mixed with fiction and fantasy. To do such a thing without losing the “spirit” of the period requires a great deal of talent and is almost impossible. But they have done it and they have done it great! But when I wrote that they treat history not too serious I did not mean “without respect” since there is a great deal of such respect that shows in costumes, characterisation, armament and in the commentaries throughout the movie. Well – there are some mistakes especially in polish cavalry (especially for me – this is the part I am interested the most J) but one can live with that. Treat it as a half historical half fantasy-adventure one and you will have a great time. The actor playing main character adds a lot to this adventurous mood – I think he has a potential for being next Johny Dep! His young and some times it shows that he need practice but he definitely has a talent. Small warning – movie might be a fantasy-adventure one but hen people die there they die, well…, realistic enough, so this is not a “family” movie. In my opinion it’s 9 out of 10 since there are some minor imperfections like the beginning is a little to slow and to mystic sometimes, there are some mistakes in costumes or armament I have mentioned above and some “wooden” background dialogs. Also this is another movie where the heavy cavalry really do not know what the charge should look like. But the movie is definitely a “must see” especially if you like historical and/or adventure shows.

Since I really like Bollywood's productions and this one has Aishwarya Rai in it I was almost sure that it will be really nice. And it almost is. The story is nice - the convention of Bollywood romances does not require originality but this one has some twist being quite interesting adaptation of famous Jane Austen novel. The cast is good - aforementioned Aishwarya as always is a bright star but the whole crew performance is really good. Moreover if you liked Gilmore Girls as I did series you will have the pleasure to see Alexis Bledel on screen again (even if for quite a short role). So why it was not as good as it should be? Well... the movie is made entirely in English. That's the first though not the biggest problem. After all in Bollywood movies sometimes even about half of the dialogs are in English mixed with Hindi. But here it is just to much. The movie lacks the "indian" feel. Can't really name the problem here but it is just not right. But the most important mistake in this picture is the music. There are no Bollywood romance without good music and this movie has it all wrong! I do not know why but producers apparently decided to do something new and all the songs in the movie are American/European/Latino style instead of good old Bollywood, sung in English. It sounds like watching Evita especially, that the style of most of those songs really resembles the early Madonna works. And it is just wrong.... I do not have anything against "early Madonna" but this just does not work here. There is much less Bollywood mood in it and therefore the movie lacks character and is far weaker than it could be.

When I got this movie it had quite a low score here on IMDb. But the subject seemed to be interesting, it was not an Hollywood production and had at least one big name in the paylist - Max von Sydow's. So I took the challenge and gave it a try. Big mistake... Though it's screenplay is written with some interesting plots and with quite an original ideas for a Jesus-related movie this is almost the only thing worth to be praised here.

The first thing you will notice is the music of someone, who's surname is Moricone but his not "the one" but some other Moricone. So is his music - kind of Moricone's style but not "the one" - something is missing, it's to loud and generally does not fit.

Then you will notice the performers and they certainly can help to forget about poor music since they performance is really stunning. Literatim. It's something like operetta filmed in the silent movie period with all those exalted movement and acting typical for those old times. Moreover my version was apparently dubbed in English although the movie was apparently made in English at the first place! I do not know why they did it - maybe some Italian actors had some problems with the language but then if you add voices to a already finished movie it is never perfect and the effect is rather ridiculous. Combined with aforementioned style of acting it looks just utterly stupid. And if this was not enough some of supporting roles are seemed to be written for computer RPG characters! You know, like for example those typical NPCs standing next to the town gates only to say something like "welcome to Jerusalem"... Some dialogues between those characters seemed o be intentionally written in Monthy Python style...

But apart from that there is also an actor there who really stands out - Dolph Lundgren! By far it is the best of his performance I had a "pleasure" to watch. Of course as every barbarian he speaks with Scottish accent witch is really sweet, especially that he apparently is trying to imitate Sean Connory... Since he plays a barbaric Germanic warrior and he has not much to do there apart from being "strong, noble and wild" and of course of swinging his enormous axe everywhere. The movie is full of scenes where Lundgren is shown somewhere in the background or foreground performing this complicated tasks and I must admit he had really mastered it. Seriously - for someone who's performing talent is so, well, narrow I think he is a real star in this movie.

Some say "there is no good movie without a love story plot". But this one could be definitely better without. I had mentioned before about some interesting and original ideas in the scenario but this is only to be observed in the first half of the movie. The second half is devoted mainly to love story plot and this just kills this otherwise would-be-weak-but-not-the-worst movie. It's just dull and absurd in the world of this picture and moreover it is completely redundant.

See for yourself if you dare but there are better ways of spending time.

I have given this movie a 4. Why? Because after the initial 10 minutes that just should not have been put there it is quite a decent horror movie, at least until the last 30 minutes that are just crap. I do not want to write a spoiler so I will try not to go into details too much. But this will not really count since this initial 10 minutes I have mentioned are the spoiler for the rest of the movie. I understand that horror movies have their own "poetic" and some things are always predictable but there are limits to it. This movie just crossed them. But skipping those 10 minutes we can enjoy kind of a mix between what the Pang brothers and generally Asian horror makers are used to serve and Western actors and surroundings and some Western horror classic. Interesting as it is as an experiment it does not really work well since those Asian and Western styles are not mixed well enough. Or maybe they just does not suit each other? Anyway this part I could give about 5 points out of 10. But after those Asian-Western style experimentation we have the last 30 minutes that are just standard Western psycho-killer crap and that is as far from interesting as it can be, just dull and predictable to the limits. Did someone just felt bored by Pang brothers and ordered the ending from somebody else? It certainly looks like it and however the first part of this movie is not really the best one the second part just killed it completely.

Is it possible that some people thought "we basically do not have any interesting story and we do not have any idea about what the story we have is about but we have Halle and Bruce so let's do it"? Apparently it is. Really. Because yes - this movie has no storyline. There is of course some plot but it just does not work. No sense, almost no logical connection between scenes, nothing. And since there was nothing interesting in the story someone thought it could be splendid idea to add some networking/computer/Internet mumbo-jumbo to blur it even more. And it worked perfectly as always when someone from Hollywood tries to input some "hacking" into the movie. Inconsequences are countless here, as countless as it is pointless to point them one by one. Together with all that crap we have Bruce, who tries to be charming or brutal randomly and Halle, who is... well, she just is. Can't find better description of her "acting" since there is no actual acting there... On the other hand even the best actor need to have some role given to act and it looks like no one actually bothered to give it to those two. And when all this finally comes to and end and you think there is no way to make it worse there is this "great suspense" about who the killer was. It was really great "suspense", it must have even surprise the author of the script himself! I bet he figured it out just ten minutes before the last shooting. I based this idea on that nothing in the previous scenes logically connect this "suspense" at the end with the rest of this chaotic story... Don't bother to watch even if you a big fan of Willis. If, on the other hand, you like Halle, well, even then better to look at some poster.

I never ever thought that there is a possibility to make such a good production in Poland. Not to mention a political one. Our TV channels are flooded with cheap, crappy, poorly directed stuff made to satisfy the lowest needs of the viewer and so commercialized that it makes you sick. But here we have completely different story. So far the director work is perfect, the screenplay brilliantly natural and the acting suits aforementioned two perfectly. I am absolutely stunned that it is possible in Poland to make something that being political fiction screened just before the election does not contain any particular propaganda! Instead it shows some political mechanics in sometimes funny but first of all very intelligent way. There is everything our nowadays politics have including dirty tricks and breaking the law etc. but directors managed to make interesting story out of it, interesting for people like me who are absolutely fed up the real "politics". I only hope that it will stay that good.

This is just a bad movie. With what seemed to be quite a nice budget it had potential to be much better. It almost were. With the heroine beautiful almost like Salma Hayek, hero fighting almost like Jackie Chan, battles and duels almost like in Crouching Tiger..., music almost like in, say, Conan... etc. Almost. But in the end it's just dull and it is hard to find anything interesting in it. Maybe apart of John Rhys-Davies flying in duel like those warriors in Hero or before-mentioned Crouching Tiger... I am really ashamed of poor old John. He is after all quite a good actor and deserves much better. So as you - so if you still have a chance just watch something else.

I was not hoping for more than I saw, but I was hoping for something a little different. I thought it probably was a crap screenplay for teenagers with standard crappy acting and overall performance but only the screenplay appeared to be as I presumed. And this is why I am giving it 1 of 10. Because this movie is a wasted potential. Many of it's elements are good, I like most of the acting, some of the decorations and locations etc. - they are not brilliant maybe but still quite good. But they wasted it for a really, really stupid, simple and just crappy screenplay that is almost 100% a copy of various elements from fantasy or sci-fi stories, books and films and moreover those copied elements are usually the most recognizable ones from those parent stories, such type everyone remembers even not being a fantasy fan. So, for such a waste of resources, the potential and on the end my time - 1 of 10. Don't bother to watch it even if you are a fantasy fan and especially if you are older than, say, 10.

It is a SF picture but you will find here nothing of what is characteristic of the "genre" as Hollywood producers usually see it. Instead it is somehow a pure science-fiction one but in the same sense as Space Odyssey was. Good story that is being told on several different levels - logical and spiritual at the same time. The story is one of those universal-truth-based, almost kind of those we are fed everyday by every "big directors" in their "milestone pictures" but it is told a nice and not invasive way so it works and do not fall to pompous style. And as I mentioned in the summary however it is a series o visions if you would like to analyse it from logical and mundane point of view it will work too. Which creates an impression than apart of creating those dreamy, artistic and spiritual visions the director and script writer did actually care for constructing the plot and even if they did not told us every aspect of their story the story has been thought through and none of the movie element were thrown into it without a reason. Worth of seeing, definitely, especially for true SF fans.

I really would like this film to be good. Especially due to my general opinion that Polish, and generally European, historical movies are usually better than those American ones. But this one is not. All right - this is not a typical "historical movie", after all it is based on the novel that was written in a specific period of time in Poland, from the specific point of view and the story is partially just an excuse to depict some universal thoughts. But then is it not the case for almost every novel? Nevertheless - the movie is bad and it is not the novel fault but the director and actors and decoration and music and... almost everything. There are but few older Polish performers who act here as they should - not a great performance but can do. The rest, that means all the younger staff, is just "plastic" or "wooden" figures who instead of performing seam to read they quotes from prompter as they would saw them for the first time. Some of them are not professionals, but others are and thats a shame... The decorations are crappy - carton boxes imitating marble (which becomes really interesting during the Great Fire of Rome when you can watch burning marble!). The music is just awful! It almost never corresponds to the picture - I especially like those moments when the epic "symphonical" music accompanies someone who for example just walks the stairs from one scene to another... The second part of the movie is a feast for sadomasochist - constant martyrdom of poor and pure Christians. Thats from the book - all right. But should it be as much of it as there is? I know - them Romans were bad and ruthless but after five minutes of gore I got the full picture all right so next fifteen minutes of another sadistic ideas just tired me, bored and then just made me laugh. But hey! there were some good performance in those scenes! "Poor Christian" are pathetic but lions performance is outstanding! No, really - this is the only really good thing since the lions were trained perfectly. No bullshitting with computer animation - just real animals and stuntman. Save your time and fast forward to lions...

Well I have just got back from the cinema and I can not stop to think about this awesome movie. It brings back the faith that they can actually make an action historical movie in Hollywood that is neither dumb nor sensless and you can watch it as if you were reading a good book. I am an admirer of good books (especially historical for the historical reenactment is my hobby) but also big fan of action in the movies. So in cinema I rather choose to watch big productions with a lot of action and good F/X'es. Unfortunatelly I do not like the situations when producers of the movie just think of me as about an amoeba when my inteligence is to be consider :-). After this season in cinema I nearly forgot that one actually can make a movie containing lots of good action and also containing a scenario! I mean scenario with a good plot, good, "non paper" characters etc. As I mentioned before when you watch this movie it is like you were reading a very good book. And this is the best recommendation I can give to it and do not think there could be any better one for a movie!

I am oh soooo glad I have not spent money to go to the cinema on it :-). It is nothing more than compilation of elements of few other classic titles like The Thing, Final Fantasy, The Abyss etc. framed in rather dull and meaningless scenario. I really can not figure out what was the purpose of creating this movie - it has absolutely nothing new to offer in its storyline which additionally is also senseless. Moreover there is nothing to watch - the FX'es look like there were taken from a second hand store, you generally saw all of them in other movies. But it is definitely a good lullaby.