The first time I tried to watch this movie, it did something to me that few movies before it have: it beat me. This movie 113 minutes long and before the 45-minute mark, I turned it off. This was due, no doubt, to another awful movie I'd seen earlier that day and when this started, I just couldn't watch another generic independent film. I turned it off and didn't come back to it until recently when I released this would be a good candidate for Movies That Suck if I watched it all the way through. This time, I powered through (even though I paused it many times to get a drink or go eat something, which, to me, is a sign that the movie isn't keeping my interest) and I was right. This movie is bad. I'm well aware that this was a very low budget independent film that went straight to DVD and while I commend somebody for trying to do an action movie with what little money they had, the end result is still not good. Before we go on, I'd just like to add that I didn't buy this. I was at a horror convention and some young women were handing out free DVDs so I just figured, "Why not?" That's one of the few good things I can say about this movie and it doesn't even have anything to do with the movie itself!
The movie is about a small-time enforcer named Truman who's been rather hot-headed and violent his entire life. During one operation, a mysterious man dressed entirely in black with a hood and wearing night-vision goggles kills many of the mob guys, including some of Truman's friends and almost kills him. A month later, Truman is having nightmares about the event but he now has a girlfriend that he truly does care about to take his mind off things. When Truman gets a job to find a man who kidnapped his boss' nephew, he discovers that this assassin is a legend among the criminal world and he's apparently got big plans for Truman.
This whole movie is just generic from top to bottom. The very premise of the movie involving mobsters and hit-men has been done time and time again and much better I might add. I don't mind action movies with this kind of setting but you've got to have a good story with it and this one just isn't worth it. It's unoriginal, has a bunch of plotholes, makes no sense, and is not interesting in the slightest.
The acting and dialogue don't help it either. Holt Boggs as the lead, Trum, is not a charismatic character. He tries to act all tough and mentally tortured but he's completely one-dimensional, doing nothing but screaming and shooting people. The story is supposed to be about him finding his place in the world and maybe leaving his violent life behind but there's no empathy for the guy so it doesn't matter. Matt Beckham as Truman's best friend, Pat, is even more unappealing. While they do act like friends, we're never told why they are so. Pat tries to come across as that funny sidekick but there's one scene where he beats a guy within an inch of his life, even when it's clear he knows nothing. Pat just keeps beating him and beating and when Truman has had enough and walks away, Pat hits the guy again before following him. What did that mean-spirited scene accomplish? Nothing other than prove that Pat is a sadistic asshole. I know they're part of the mob but even Truman is disgusted by what Pat did to that guy. One character that I kind of liked was Ash, played by Diana Lee Inosanto. She's a friend of Truman's who has information about the assassin that's stalking him. I don't know why but she's quirky and funny enough to where I kind of liked her... and she gets killed in the second scene she's in.
Mirelly Taylor as Truman's girlfriend, Nicki, seems like a nice enough girlfriend and it's hinted that she could help Truman escape from the violent world he's part of. But, at the end of the day, she doesn't really do much to be memorable. Another friend of Truman's, King, played by Lawrence Varnado (who I swear reminded me of Charles S. Dutton when I first saw him), is someone who's had a bad run-in with the assassin in the past and was the only one who survived. He reluctantly tries to get Nicki away from the city so the killer won't get her but he ultimately fails. Again, not a bad character, but comes off as a cliche in the end. There's Marc Jeffreys as the mob boss JT, who is so cliched in characterization and portrayal (think The Sopranos) that he's not worth talking about. Ricky, played by Marc Hebert, is the nephew who's kidnapped by the assassin and his scenes where he's held captive would make you think you're watching a Saw movie rather than an action flick. It's that typical dark, dungeon-like setting where Ricky is tied up, tortured (he's already lost an eye and, while we don't see it actually happen, we see later that his legs have been cut off) and almost gets away before being dragged back inside and killed. Not much else to say about that. There's not much to say about Danny (Jay Moses) who I think was Truman's younger brother but I'm not sure. It doesn't matter. He gets killed at the very beginning of the movie. There are other characters (one of which is played by Dameon Clarke who voiced the evil Cell in the Funimation dub of Dragonball Z) but I don't remember who was who and I don't care.
Now let's get to the assassin: Rains. It turns out he takes his name from The Invisible Man and Claude Rains, the actor who played the title role in that film (he even at one point uses the alias Jack Griffin, the actual name of the title character of that film). He's meant to be this boogeyman among the crime world; a mystery that people wonder is real or not. He's also portrayed to be a menacing terrorist-like character who plants hidden cameras everywhere and can watch your every move. He's had his eye on Truman for a while and he says that what convinced him that Truman was the right choice to take his place was when he watched an interrogation video of Truman when he was a kid and he said he didn't feel sorry for beating up this other kid. I honestly didn't find him to be menacing in the slightest and even found him to be a joke. For one, he's apparently killed several times and yet just gets up. Granted, he could be wearing body armor beneath his suit but that doesn't explain how, in one scene, after he's been shot and is apparently dead, he gets up and comes up from behind Truman (who'd momentarily turned away from looking at him) all without making a sound. Not only that but he's placed so many little cameras everywhere that you have to wonder how he knew somebody was going to be there at a certain time. Is he psychic or something? And some of those cameras are in places where it would be hard to put them there without being seen. One thing I will give the filmmakers is that at the end of the movie, Truman apparently kidnaps the wrong man when he breaks into a motel room where Rains is supposed to be hiding. After almost killing the guy, he lets him go when it seems like he's the wrong man but it turns out he isn't. That surprised me, I must say. I also have to commend them for not having it be Truman's father, because I was expecting them to do that. Still, Rains, like almost everything else in the movie, just doesn't work.
The dialogue in this movie is as bad as most of the acting. My biggest complaint is that there are so many F-bombs in this movie that you'd think Rob Zombie wrote it. I honestly get sick of hearing "fuck" said every other word. Many writers, Zombie included, seem to think that's how people really talk or that it's edgy. It's neither. In fact, it feels childish, like a little kid who discovered the word "fuck" for the first time and is saying it constantly. I just find it annoying, like the writer can't think of any way to make the movie mature other than to swear a lot.
The very look of the movie is generic and the action scenes and editing make it clear how low budget it is. The film has either a blue tint or brown tint depending on what time of day it is, which I get tired of seeing just because it's used so much. The action scenes themselves could be good if the editing wasn't so quick and crazy that you could tell what was going on. Often during an action scene, the movie will suddenly shift in look. I can't explain it very well but there are moments where it'll look like a low budget TV show or like it was filmed with a regular camera (if you've seen the movie, you'll know what I'm talking about). I'm guessing they did this to make the action look faster or more dynamic but it just looks unprofessional. Now not all of the action scenes are bad. There are some fights which are choreographed decently and look fair enough but they still can't save the movie.
While the story is, as I said, forgettable, it does have some interesting points to it that could have made for a fair movie if done better. Truman is a character who seems to really hate the violent world he's a part of and Nicki may be able to help him escape from it. Rains also talks to Truman through recordings about him finding his niche in the grand scheme of things and Truman does seem to understand his capacity for bloodshed and compassion in his life. The ending, where Truman confronts the unmasked Rains and where he ultimately kills him (with Rains saying that he's so proud) and leaves to take his place as an assassin (we assume) could be interesting if the movie leading up to it was done better. But the cliched plot and uninteresting characters behind it make you just not care.
Other than some decent parts of the music score, there's not much else I can say about The Prodigy. I'm not saying that this movie is entirely bad because it's not that original. Quentin Tarantino often takes old ideas and makes good movies out of them. The point is that you've got to do something interesting with those old ideas. This movie just doesn't do that. It's generic, has an uninteresting story (although, as I said, there are some potentially good concepts in it), and the characters are cliched and forgettable. I feel bad slamming an independent movie because I can imagine it must be difficult to make on but that's honestly how I feel. Sorry, William Kaufman (the director), but this just isn't good.
No comments:
Post a Comment