Hey, everyone. ”Moriarty” here.

Look, I’ll be honest. Yes, I am excited to see this movie. I thought the script was a wicked sick joke, and when I visited the set, I thought it was obvious that everyone involved was in tune with writer/director Michael Davis and his vision for this thrill ride.

But I don’t just run reviews that say what I want to hear. We had a fistful of reviews from the SHOOT ‘EM UP screening last week, all of which were pretty positive. That matches what I’ve heard after every screening of the film so far. This is the only review we’ve been sent that even slightly differs, and I want to offer it up as semi-counterpoint to what we’ve already published:

Hey,

I too saw the screening at Pasadena and, after reading the posted reviews, I had to send in a dissenting opinion. The film is what it is. It's mindless, ridiculous, and over-the-top (all this in a good way)... but it doesn't quite fulfill. Just to start off, there are around two or three shootouts (about 30min of the film) at the start before we get even a hint of the story. As cool as the sequences are, there just comes a point where you ask "wtf is this about?"

Then the movie proceeds to have a crapload more of action sequences with minimal story development. And again, action is good but with a fucking purpose. Eye candy with little story can be very successful as we've seen with 300, but this film had even LESS story than 300, if that's possible.

And the action set pieces... well, honestly they didn't thrill me. The first several ones were badass but then it just got repetitive. With no story development, it was just gunfight after gunfight of shoot, dodge, do something with a carrot, then shoot again. The fact that they change the setting ten times doesn't really help. The entire movie can be boiled down to an hour and a half long gunfight that has little else to hold it up.

But I wish that were its only problem.

(Spoiler ahead) The movie's lowest point is, perhaps, when the baby is thrown out of Clive Owen's speeding car when another car crashes into it. Before Clive can recover the baby, the bad guy pretty much runs over it and the audience's collective jaw drops ("Omgz, they ran over teh baby!!!1"). Then it's revealed that that wasn't the baby, oh no. It was a completely, functional animatronic baby complete with realistic skin, facial motors to create expressions, and a crying soundtrack, all of which Clive Owen just PULLED OUT OF HIS ASS because no other explanation is given. Really, that was like the last straw. If that goes, then anything else could've happened the rest of the movie.

What I'm trying to get to is, the film really couldn't decide what it wanted to be. It starts out as action with some dark humor. Then it shifts to being quirky. Then it becomes a little tongue in cheek. Then it's just simply over-the-top and finally it just crosses into Looney Tunes territory. It was pretty hard to settle down to watch it with a certain set of expectations when they kept changing every 20min.

Add to that that the main character had nearly zero backstory....

But to be fair, the movie's cool factor is pretty high, the dialogue is funny, and the actors did a hell of a job with what was given to them.

Just throwing out a dissenting opinion.
Za Jakkal