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Booster Gold takes a gander at SOLDIER - review
SPOILER ALERT !!
Well here's another unhappy customer with SOLDIER, bummer. Now you do need to realize that this is a rough cut and that it is not the finished product. We'll continue to monitor the film. Personally both Glen and I loved the script to this project. I love both Jason Scott Lee and Kurt Russell. I haven't cared that much for Paul Anderson because his films do nothing beyond a visual level for me, and at that level it feel manufactured. I was really hoping this was his breakthrough. Oh, and for everyone on the TALK BACK yesterday. THE AVENGERS script was pretty dang good, but the film was butchered beyond all belief. When the film was in editing at Pinewood, the editors were instructed to 'Remove all those British parts, audiences just aren't getting it'. According to sources at Pinewood the nearly 45 minute longer print was far better than the butchered print that came out of the test screening process. Oh well, perhaps we'll get a look at the complete cut someday.
Booster Gold checking in here from the Burbank test screening of SOLDIER.
Overall, the movie is NOT the total piece if shit described by Hallenbeck,
but
it does have substantial problems.
The basic Plot: in some quasi-fascist future, babies are taken from the womb
and inundated with military training for 18 years, turning them into
remorseless jarhead robots capable of anything in the name of bringing their
superiors victory (this is outlined in a rather gripping opening sequence in
which we see Kurt Russell's character as a boy being subjected to Clockwork
Orange-style brainwashing designed to program his mind to respond positively
to violence). We are shown a rather herky-jerky series of jump cuts as
Russell's character, Todd (now adult and played by Kurt) blasts his way
through a series of fictional future wars, presumably all won by Kurt's
side.
Finally, we see Kurt's "trained-from-birth" platoon compared against a new
breed of soldiers, those "genetically contructed before birth", personified
by
Jason Scott Lee as Caine. Gary Busey, Kurt's CO, is proud of "his boys" and
winds up having to pit three of his older soldiers against one Jason Scott
Lee. In this fight, a pretty original set piece in which all four soldiers
battle mano-a-mano while trying to hang on to vertical chains, all three of
Busey's soldiers lose to Lee (and are believed dead, except Kurt is still
alive, barely).
Jason Scott Lee's character exhibits tremendous menace in this scene, and I
remember thinking that I couldn't wait to see these two mix it up in the
finale. More on this later.
Kurt winds up in a garbage dumper and is deposited on Arcadia 234, a
"garbage
dumping planet", where he soon encounters the survivors of a crash who have
built a community based on recycling the trash they find on the planet.
There
are periodic windstorms that are part of the village's everyday life, and
Kurt
manages to win their trust when he saves a villager (Michael Chiklis) from
the
windstorms (in a scene that is both unsuspenseful and, unforgivably,
difficult
to follow).
Eventually, Kurt's soldier programming starts to short circuit and he is
haunted by the women and children he has seen caught in the hell of warfare
(some of whom he'd disposed of himself), visions and memories that prevent
him
from effectively assimilating into the commune on the trash planet.
He is banned from the village in a well-written scene, but after a young
mute
boy shows heretofore unknown courage against a deadly serpent (presumably
from
modeling himself after Russell), one of the villagers goes out into the
trash
wilderness to find Russell and bring him back. "We were wrong". This is NOT
a
well written transition, and I failed to see the reason for the change of
heart.
Just as this occurs, the military arrives to do a "security sweep" and
arbitrarily murder any trespassers on the garbage planet (the thinnest of
reasons to bring Russell into conflict with Jason Scott Lee again,
admittedly).
What follows is a third act of almost pure action, but except for 2 very
minor
moments of action invention, it's all machine guns and spark hits. There is
NO
EVIDENCE in this sequence that Russell is any more capable than, say,
Indiana
Jones at taking down a team of soldiers...and for "genetically constructed
super soldiers", the forces led by Jason Scott Lee don't seem much more
deadly
than a squad of "really good" Imperial Stormtroopers.
Consequently, by the time Russell and Lee face off for the aforementioned
final battle, the first thing that popped into my head was: "Kurt's got a
gun,
Jason doesn't. Why doesn't he just shoot him?" That's how disinterested I
was
in their "battle" by the time it was about to occur.
Of course, all ends happily, and we are left with the impression that Kurt's
"killing machine" may have found his inner-child. Fine by me.
Russell, to his credit, does it YET AGAIN. He is second only to Harrison
Ford
when it comes to movie "alchemy" (namely, turning lead to gold just by being
there), but this skimpy, 94-minute action exercise is below his talents. The
FX (not the temp frame fillers, but the more final ones) are the best
special
effects of 1983 (nuff said about that).
There you have it. Should make for a kick ass night in front of your DVD
player, but for $20 a head (with parking and concessions), this is NOT a
great
value, folks. Sorry WB, please try again.
-
+ Expand All
-
sucked ass too...
-
that this flick reminds us of Universal Soldier in the first place is one of it's problems. Now since I liked the first Mortal Kombat and loved Event Horizon i'm willing to give soldier a chance. I wouldn't mind seeing it kicked back to january for reshoots or somesuch just to get some decent action in there, 'cause we as the audience have grown past rambo holding a machine gun and nonchalantly waving it's path of fire at the bad guys.
that was almost totally incoherent.
-SDM -
This review was much better then Hallenbeck's, it was fairly-well written, polite and sedate, profanity-free, and looked objectively at a work-in-progress it seems. That's the kind of review I want to see. It also told the plot without giving anything SERIOUS away (Spoilers aren't enough to stop me). Anyway, two good reviews aren't gonna stop me from seeing this film!
-
I was at Burbank the other night and I must have seen a different movie (been in a different time/space continuum?). Kurt Russell reminds me of what Harrison Ford would be if he took time off from carpentry and went to the gym a bit more - he's ridiculously cool, absolutely engaging and vulnerable at the same time...all with hardly a line to speak.
The movie's a perfect hybrid of some of my favorite films - Bladerunner, Unforgiven (spot the
Webb-Peoples fan!) and Terminator with a second act straight out of Witness. The bad guys are great, utterly callously indifferent to death as only military executives can be and every time you're just about to tire of gentle character stuff up pops a bit of superbly nasty action to get your heart pumping.
Director Paul Anderson's finally shown what that eye of his can do given a half-decent script, Jason Scott-Lee's a sight to behold and Gary Busey and the guy from Event Horizon are a marriage made in military hell - I don't know if the actors hated each other or what but they sure fooled me.
Shoot me - I even cried at the end, after a fantastic climactic fight scene in the rain (that man Peoples again).
So what's Hallenbecke's(sp?) problem? I know there was some law suit over the avengers although
I don't know the details - is that behind the bile or did he just not get it? At least you wanted to enjoy it (tho' I actually did!) Either way this is one that I predict (but who listens to me?!) will get WB back on track and build audiences just like Bladerunner did; by word of mouth - in spite of it's 'all action' billing.
That's the view from my beautiful mac anyway (just a plug for the love of my life!)
the lone reviewer
"hi ho Joel Silver" -
Listen, for all those people out there, this movie is not SAVING PRIVATE RYAN!!!!! This is not some masterpiece that everybody will go to. This sounds like a solid action movie which is exactly what it is. No emotions, and basically no story either. Some people just go to movies for the FX and action , witness the success of Twister and ID4. That is all that they will get from this movie. Pesonally the movie looks like Judge Dredd, which was awesome!!!! Also, this is set in the Blade Runner universe, so i'm sure alot of people will go see it!!!!
-
For starters - I can't see what this film has got to do with Blade Runner, unless of course , you know something I don't and your copy of "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep" is different to mine. Anyway I just want to say that sure, some people go to these films for the action and thrills, but there is a difference between quality action movies and bog standard old ideas rehashed into an action movie by numbers. I guess I'm getting old or something but more often than not I walk out of a major studio movie feeling like a sucker and not satisfied at all. Maybe thats because I like using my brain and Hollywood thinks the audience don't have one. Look out for this British movie though "Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels" , crap title - great movie. Fans of "soccer" look out for Vinnie Jones the Wimbledon hard man in a great role.
-
I don't really care for the director of this movie, but I had intended to see it for the screenwriter. I'm not sure that I can spell his name off the top of my head, please forgive, but David Webb Poeples? The writer of Unforgiven, Blade Runner, Twelve Monkeys, etc.
So, if some people have read the script, and some people have seen the movie... am I seeing a movie by one of the guys who made 12 Monkeys or one of the guys who made Event Horizon?(big, big difference for me) WB got rid of Kevin Smith's Superman script, so I don't know how smart they are when it comes to recognizing the talent of their screenwriters...
What I've read for the film has turned me off big-time- the Entertainment Weekly article, where the director was saying, you know, "Its a Western in Outer Space!" Its a floor wax! Its a dessert topping! Doesn't give one an impression that the director knows... anything, let alone science fiction.
-Abhay -
I thought some parts were stange...like in the beginning Superman talking to the Mayor's son (OMG, what the hell was that!). It seems that everyone says "it was great" because a few cool people did. I even have felt the urge to.
-
They showed the trailer of SOLDIER before yesterday's screening of BLADE...ehhem..
The crowd at hand laughed at several of the unconvincing, Toaster-quality SFX (especially a spaceship taking off) and the sad "look, it's Snake if he were an android"-delievery of Kurt Russel. Don't get me wrong...I love Kurt...but PLEASE let him stop making movie that should be straight to video and star Mario Van Peebles (wait...they did make that movie...except it wasn't in space...).
To quate the audience at hand:
HISSSSSSSSSS! -
I think I'll either pay matinee price($4.50, I don't buy concessions) or wait for my $1 theater but I HAVE TO SEE THIS ON THE BIG SCREEN. The sets are huge and I think I may like it. But if I don't, it's going to be a long winter, since What Dreams May Come and Star Trek Insurrection are the only legitamite sci-fi movies left for 1998. Pleasantville looks absolutely horrible, BTW.
1999, in the other hand, has Wing Commander, Star Wars Episode 1, Wild Wild West, and on and on.
I also like Judge Dredd----even more than Braveheart or Batman Forever(other summer 1995 movies). It had alot of action and some intiguing visions of the future.
Kurt is #3 all time on the coolness factor, third only to Chow Yun-Fat and Val Kilmer. Jackie Chan and Jeff Bridges are my other favorite actors, but they don't look so cool kicking butt.
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