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A_Roode: When you said [SPOILER -- swipe to read): The film would have been perfect if the last shot had been Tommy Lee Jones sitting on his bed with the contents of the opened package in his hands... , I got goosebumps, and not the R.L. Stine kind. Wow. What a fantastic, Seven moment. You ought to have been brought in to tweak the script, dude. Seriously.

If the filmmakers had taken that cue from you, my friend, my bet is there would be no way In the Valley of Elah could possibly be denied a shot at Best Picture.

Great stuff, there. Props, man.

I remain, as always...

An Admirer.

Well, Nico, I finally got to see The Kingdom. Firstly, this film has recived more different, contradictory, and opposing reviews than I've ever seen.

However, they're all wrong. It's neither great nor awful.

Here;s what I liked- the crime aspect, the detecting aspect, the initial scenes where the FBI are restricted from doing anything. And of course, the big shoot-out, which is as good as anything Bourne has done.

Here's what I disliked- the politics. The Saudis are treated as either idiots or terrorists. I mean surely the Saudi police has SOME sense of forensics, but this film depicts them as morons. And that scene where the team are chasing after their captured friend, and they drive in to a dangerous area... and suddenly it feels as if everyone has an ak47 in their living room- it just felt a little silly. Which would be fine, but the film tries to be realistic with its opening mini-history of US-Saudi relations, and that talked-about final moment, which makes a very, very dangerous link between the FBI and terrorists- it's either a moronic broad statement that makes no sense, or an end-note to show the spiral of violence will always continue. If the latter, that point should have been developed more throughout the movie.

Overall, I think A Roode said it best, this film should be called Rambo 5: Syriana- but it really can't be both.

Six: Glad you finally got to see it! Hope you didn't think I encouraged you to waste your money.

To reply, briefly...

...[T]his film has recived more different, contradictory, and opposing reviews than I've ever seen.

[Nodding] Yeah, I'd have to agree with that. Maybe its genre-spanning ambitions trip everyone up.

Here;s what I liked- the crime aspect, the detecting aspect, the initial scenes where the FBI are restricted from doing anything. And of course, the big shoot-out, which is as good as anything Bourne has done.

All agreed.

...[W]hat I disliked- the politics. The Saudis are treated as either idiots or terrorists. I mean surely the Saudi police has SOME sense of forensics, but this film depicts them as morons.

You've got a point, here, no question. With the exception of Colonel Al Ghazi (and, really, I CANNOT say enough about newcomer Ashraf Barhom's performance in The Kingdom...), all Saudis are portrayed as either obfuscators, boobs or tools. I, too, would have preferred to see a little more (forgive the computer-nerd term, here) "peer-to-peer" interaction in the film. For certain, the Kingdom of Saud may not be on the same page as the U.S., but it's not exactly the Third World, either. They have more than enough money and intellect to have a solid, professionally run national police force, personal loyalites and politics aside.

And that scene where the team are chasing after their captured friend, and they drive in to a dangerous area... and suddenly it feels as if everyone has an ak47 in their living room- it just felt a little silly.

I'm not sure I agree that it's silly... There are certainly neighborhoods in Egypt, Lebanon, Somalia, the West Bank and, of course, Iraq which more closely resemble National Guard armory than, say, Mayberry. Guns ARE political cache in many countries around the world... But, I'm not sure Saudi Arabia is one of them. The Saudi Royal Family lives in constant fear of insurrection and a general uprising, I don't know how liberal they are in terms of who can own guns, or mortars, or SAMs. One would hope that, at least, shoulder-mounted anti-tank missiles would come with a five-day waiting period. The Kingdom may have portrayed certain sectors of Baghdad far more accurately than it did, say, Riyadh.

[T]he film tries to be realistic with its opening mini-history of US-Saudi relations, and that talked-about final moment, which makes a very, very dangerous link between the FBI and terrorists- it's either a moronic broad statement that makes no sense, or an end-note to show the spiral of violence will always continue.

I'm in total agreement with the latter.

If the latter, that point should have been developed more throughout the movie.

See, here's where I get something very, very different out of it. I think The Kingdom is very much a film that is intended to work on multiple levels, and that changes, quite powerfully, as the minutes tick by. You enter, as an audience member, with perhaps conflicting expectations of what you are about to see. A carefully detached history lesson follows, which gives you some context, some knowledge. Much good will it do you. Then the next hour and a half of the film, with its portrayal of sympathetic American characters and their plight, putting them in a variety of (first, nonviolent) situations where we can't help but root for them -- their difficulties investigating the attacks, their head-butting with locals, their investments in goodwill with Saudi counterparts -- THEN, putting them in mortal danger, with ever-building crises culminating in an all-out firefight / brawl, is designed to STRIP YOU OF THAT CONTEXT. To make you [i]INVEST[/i] in these (American) characters and their lone Saudi collaborator, to become an advocate, a partisan. (Just like everybody else who comes to the Kingdom, no matter their original intent.) To DENY YOU THE ABILITY TO REMAIN DETACHED. You enter this world, especially after such a refined, deliberately apolitical mini-documentary, perhaps expecting to see everything at an emotional remove. Then, the roller-coaster begins, and by then end you can't HELP but cheer for these Americans as they variously shoot, smash and detonate all comers. Then we come to the end, and everybody's having that Taster's Choice moment, feeling good for having "won," and thinking that all is right with the world -- the good guys (Americans) came, sought, fought, persevered and emerged victorious, and they get to go home now and close the book on this, and they go on to bigger and better things, having "spread democracy" to yet another corner of the globe, and their world is that much safer now, their enemies having been vanquished.

Only... their world ISN'T safer, and their enemies HAVEN'T been vanquished, and what we've spread, no matter what its original, peaceable intentions -- to catch killers, to preserve order, to BRING THEM TO JUSTICE -- what their legacy will be, in the end, is merely to SPREAD THE FIRE. The end is the beginning again. Now we see exactly what we're faced with: The enemy is US. Just as passionate, just as aggrieved, just as adamant, just as deadly. And just thirty seconds ago we were cheering. For Rambo.

I think it all adds up to one of the very best [strong language -- swipe to read]mind-fucks in the history of modern cinema. We walk in, with our pretty convictions and safe nonjudgmentalism, sitting on the sidelines, status quo. (We can afford to be -- we haven't got skin in the game, yet. The rest of the movie is to get us to IDENTIFY with the skin that IS in the game.) We get caught up in the blood and the heat and the moment, and end up cheering as "our guys" win. Then, SMACK, we find out, no one won ANYTHING. A new blood debt, a new cycle. A new day in The Kingdom. All we did was made it go on. And on, and on.

I stand by my original review. But, I'm glad you liked what you did!

I'll conclude by saying this: You're right... The Kingdom is both less AND more than what people expected.

And, I've had a heckuva lot of fun talking about it. Thanks!

I remain, as always...

Nico.

Nico, while I can't say I liked The Kingdom, I definitely don't regret paying to see it- hell, it's been a while since I've seen a film that prompted so much debate.

And yes, you're right about the film- it's a gung-ho action film that turns itself on its head at the very end. But it's that last momentthat frustrates me. I felt as if the director pulls a very glib mood, jerking the audience in a very direct way: "you're supposed to think this, but HAH, you're wrong, look at THIS"- moves should show, not tell, and I felt a bit jerke aound by the film's director. But hey, maybe more actions movies should jerk audiences around- at lewast the film is generating debate.

i personally would have liked to have seen it been made in another way, like Syriana, which, when you look for the "bad-guy", is a very subtle film. Now if only The Game Plan did the same.

i personally would have liked to have seen it been made in another way, like Syriana, which, when you look for the "bad-guy", is a very subtle film.

There's a reason Syriana is in my personal Top Ten Films of All Time. One of my favorite quotes from that film: "He's a soldier. He's just like you." An interminably fascinating, entrancingly thought-provoking, endlessly rewatchable film.

Now if only The Game Plan did the same.

[Snort] I love your sense of humor, Six. We should talk more. [Grin]

I remain, as always...

Nico.

Is The Kingdom in any way similar to a little film called Transformers?

Wait, anyhow, we never actually got your opinion on Lord Michael Bay's Transformers Nico because you went fishing at Lake Placid.

So what did you think of it Nico?

[Laughing]

Hm, what did I think of Transformers? What did I think of Transformers...

I'll really try to make this brief.

First off, I friggin' LOVED the film. It was just about the most exhilirating time I've had at the movies since Return of the Jedi, or at least since Armageddon (which, unlike some folks around here, I happen to ADORE). It was a total roller-coaster ride, the perfect popcorn film.

The special effects, the technical achievements, the hard-rock soundtrack elements, were FLAWLESS. Michael Bay's interpretation / realization of the Autobots and Decepticons were absurdly fantastic. He kept the film grounded in the adolescent roots of the concept, the manic glee with which kids have mashed together warring robots locked in mortal battle for generations. He injected enough menace and violence to make the film accessible to mature audiences, too, without losing the gee-whiz appeal younger fans have always been drawn to.

My wife even liked this film, which is really, really saying something. She is SO not its audience.

That being said... it was far from flawless.

Parts dragged for me. I thought there were too many human characters, and many of them were poorly conceived, scripted, cast and executed. There were too many attempts at cheap humor, a lot of pacing problems. John Turturro was ridiculous. Jon Voight was stiffer than a circuit board. And a lot of the film score, the non-singles, instrumental elements I mean, was uninspired and sounded like it had been cribbed from other Bay films.

Some of the battles, particularly the final street confrontation, went on too long. There wasn't enough character development of the Transformers themselves, other than Prime and Bumblebee. And I thought the entire concept of the All-Spark was just this side of stupid. Same for the Hoover Dam plot element.

But what the film did right, it did REALLY right. Shia LaBeouf and Megan Fox turned in FANTASTIC performances, and everything about the interaction between Bumblebee and his two human friends was PERFECT. I loved Kevin Dunn. Josh Duhamel grabbed my attention.

LOVED Hugo Weaving as Cybertron, though personally I had hoped the filmmakers would cast Vin Diesel. The interactions between Cybertron and Starscream hinted at a backstory I'd love to see more of. Sam Witwicky hocking his ancestor's prized possessions on eBay was just inspired, taking the character in a totally different direction from what we've come to expect out of these sorts of movies. And Frenzy was just terrific.

But for all its minor faults, I thought this film was really something. I gave it an 8/10 on IMDb, and would grade it a solid B. It was exactly what a summer blockbuster ought to be: inventive, spectacular, fun, loud, rowdy. It's in my Top Ten of the year. I'm hoping for great things from the sequel.

I remain, as always...

Nico.

Nicodemus wrote:

LOVED Hugo Weaving as Cybertron, though personally I had hoped the filmmakers would cast Vin Diesel. The interactions between Cybertron and Starscream hinted at a backstory I'd love to see more of.

I mean I'm not the biggest Transformers nerd on the planet but I remember Hugo Weaving playing the voice of a character named Megatron, not the Transformers' home planet Cybertron. Hehe Nico, that's the best typo ever.

Or unless you managed to get your hands on a spanish-dubbed and incorrectly-subtitled version of the film.

And I'm glad to hear you loved the film.

I'm glad to find another person that had a flying good time with Armageddon as much as I did.

But I must say this ultra-condensed version of Armageddon is damn hilarious.

http://www.rinkworks.com/movieaminute/m/armageddon.shtml

Whups. Er, yeah, Megatron. It was pretty darned lat when I typed that...

I remain, as always...

Nico.

Nico are you saying you liked starscream. Cause if you do..... Your like my new best friend. Easily my fav character. Always has been. He was great because he was pretty much the only one who always thought for himself rather than the team. Hehehe... Anyways. Everyone knows it comes out next tuesday right? I can't decide which one to buy. Best buy has a thirty dollar mondo special edition. But Wal Mart has an exclusive "mini prequel" with optimuses voice. I can't decide.

Didn't know about the Wally World version, I might have to check that out! And, you had BETTER believe I love Starscream!!! My biggest hope for Transformers 2: The Wrath of Megatron (not Cybertron, [wink]) is that some sort of power struggle occurs between Starscream and Megatron (Galvatron?) that shakes up the Decepticon power structure (and, perhaps, the Autobot hierarchy as well).

I've actually really, really, really been thinking about this. Far too much for a middle-aged man (rat!), I suspect. [Grin] I ain't right.

I remain, as always...

Nico.

You've all gotten the phone/email message 'from' Optimus Prime about the DVD release, right?

Not sure if you guys have this in the states, but it's a transforming Optimus Prime as the DVD case. It's pretty cool.

Pretty cool ey?

http://www.ezydvd.com.au/item.zml/795761

DAMN... That's... sweeeeeeeeeeet.

I remain, as always...

Nico.

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