As a big fan of Lukjanenko, the author of the book and the book itself, I so wished the movie would be any good. But unfortunately it isn't. And I am very sad to give this review
First of all I would like to thank the author for a great story. For some reasons this book puts me in a special mental state, so I have listened to an audio version of it more than enough to know the story by heart.
Now about the movie. My major complain goes to the screenwriter. Almost all story lines and characters, including the main ones were changed so heavily, that the whole thing stopped to make any sense after the first 30 minutes of the movie. I probably said "whaat the hell??" 100 times watching the movie. Somehow, to my regret, bad screenwriting became an epidemic in the russian movie industry. It's like they think that if they add some visual effects to the movie, they are justified to make a sloppy work on the story, which is what a good movie is actually always about. Common guys, that is just a lazy thinking!
Ok, you might say that I am biased by the book and it's always difficult to convert a book to a movie. So what if you haven't read the book? To that I would say - it will be even worse to watch, because you will just fail to understand what the hell is going on. Characters suddenly start talking about things and calling names you've never heard before. In my opinion you will not understand motivations and the logic, so you will be left to sit and wonder who is doing what and why.
My advise - skip the movie, read or listen the book.
