Vantage Point Review

So if Rashomon and 24 had a bastard illegitimate offspring I'm pretty sure this is what it would look like. No wonder 24 turned down this premise a few years ago when it was pitched as the starting point of a season... I'm not sure how in hindsight, maybe it was the really slick trailer, the superb cast or my love of political thrillers but I was really psyched for this one, too bad it turned out terribly. Each actor, with the exception of Forest Whtiaker, give poor to terrible performances. Special note goes to Matthew Fox who is remarkably hammy and awful in a career worst performance. Dennis Quaid, who I usually really like, is literally just channeling Kiefer Sutherland's Jack Bauer...only not well. Whitaker, too his immense credit, really tries his best to give something to his underdeveloped character. He is one of the finest actors working today and it saddens me to see him stuck and such an awful role. In defense of all the actors they do have to read some of the worst lines this side of Lifetime made-for-tv specials. Also, while the premise itself is cute, the execution is not. Director Pete Travis manages to painfully drag out the film's 90 minute runtime, his use of rewind and redundant shots are especially painful. Yes we understand that the bomb that goes off causes devestation and that terrorist bombs are bad things...we don't need each character's scenes to have slo-mo choppy 'chaos' shots of the bomb's aftermath, once will do. I guess the film is most tolerable when it cranks up the action in the last act and stops disrupting the action with rewinding/ticking clock segments; yet even still the action comes of as a very poor man's Bourne Ultimatum hindered even further by such poor editing that the shots often have no semblence of running together. If they give awards for making cool trailers for bad movies then this movie's editor deserves to be in the running with whoever cut Jumper's trailer for Most Deceptive Trailer. Don't be fooled by the awesome cast and slick trailer, from my vantage point, or any other, this movie is junk.

Overall Score: 3/10