Screening Log, August 2007

Ultraviolet
USA / 2006

From writer-director Kurt Wimmer comes Cliché. Chocked full of enough Christian symbolism to make you vomit sacramental wine, Cliché is a romp through the shitty distopian future, in which a Hemophage named Violet must defend her race against the dictatorial reign of a pure-human government. Is this an allegory for the Holocaust, as the opening leads us to believe? Yes. Is this a story of religion’s hold over politics? Absolutely. Is this just an excuse to see Mila Jovovich in amazingly tight clothes? Definitely. Cliché is whatever you want it to be! Kick-ass sci-fi flick, futuristic tear-jerker, subdued hero-and-geek romanceÑyou name it, and Wimmer has somehow jostled it into the storyline.

In all seriousness, this is a truly awful color-by-numbers revenge film, heavy with purpose but lacking in the will or creativity to express it. During many of the choreographed action sequences, Mila Jovovich ambles from one villain to another, unable to express any emotion besides complete boredom. (In fact, if you look closely, you can actually see her falling asleep mid-slaughter.) The special-effects is jumpy and overly blinding while, at the same time, not fully formedÑthe final shot, in which the camera swoops down over the teeming utopia, reveals that the entire populace is living in plastic Monopoly houses rather than fully-formed homes.

The only upside: An actress who goes almost unnoticed as the voice of a computer. When Jovovich’s Violet steps into the Ministry and her body is scanned for ammunition, the computer’s reply is simple and quick, with a hint of fun: “Number of weapons found: Many.”

by Adam Balz | Source: DVD
23 Aug 2007 2:26 PM | Comments (2)


Comments / 2 total / Submit Comment

  1. rrho
    24 August 2007
    2:28 AM
    Website

    Thanks. One of the funniest and most precise reviews of this fun little crap movie that I’ve read so far.


  2. Dennis
    24 August 2007
    12:18 PM

    This movie is dreadful, but also rather entertainingly hilarious, albeit in concentrated spurts. My favorite bit is the shootout atop the building with the Asian gang. So funny…


Submit Comment / Some HTML is OK / Preview your remarks below


Preview Comment

August 2007 activity

Total Log Entries: 51


Total Comments: 35



Full Archive

Recent Updates