The movie is categorized as drama here, but actually it is a grotesque. It is not meant to be a realistic depiction of business consulting, but exaggerating the characters and the plot. Production value is low, but the movie still works, because it fits to the message. These people are afraid to walk out of the 5 star hotel rooms in the under-developed countries they exploit for their "company" so the outside is just papier-mâché cubicles in the distance "what country is this?" - it doesn't matter. That works well, because the actors are doing an excellent job. I can only judge the German original which has some great lines especially when they speak their bad businesses English translating idioms word by word. Not sure if that can be properly localized. It is still somehow believable although the characters are clearly a caricature. Essentially it is a studio theater adapted for film with some additional effects. You don't need to see everything. Hearing screams and gunshots is enough. The scary image is created in your head. Good entertainment for the thinking man. Probably not for everyone though.
Reviews
4 Reviews
The Last Ship
(2014–2018)
Video game like
24 August 2014
The trailer and back story is a little misleading. This is (one of the) last battle ships on earth for no apparent reason and you are on the hunt for a vaccine. This could lead to complicated story line arcs, but instead it becomes a weird Cold War scenario with evil Russians. Today's cut scenes of modern ego-shooters have more deep and sound background. In fact this really feels like you are watching someone playing an FPS on YouTube. The fighting scenes of both the ship and the close quarter combat look realistic and intense. However it feels like the cast chose the easy difficulty setting, because they always win without any casualties against masses of superior enemies. Own weapons have aim-bot like precision and the enemy soldiers have reduced reaction times. The strange thing is, somehow the formula works. It is surprisingly fun to watch. You will just tend to fast forward to the action. Kinda like playing a video game with an awful and too slow paced storyline where you skip every second video clip and wait for the next adrenaline rush. Oh and go join the US Navy. The technically and ethically most advanced army in the post apocalyptic world. And don't forget to prepare yourself for the end of days. You will need a lot of preserved food and GUNS!
Knowing
(2009)
Pseudo science and Christian propaganda
31 May 2013
Warning: Spoilers
While the movie shows a nice zoom of earth at night at first, it becomes ridiculously soon after. A small girl suggests to create a time capsule at her school and then seems to write numbers down like a remote controlled robot. No one cares. The teacher just collects the pictures from the other pupils and whatever. I bet if a girl behaves that psychotic even the laziest teacher would call the psychiatrists. Why did she want to bury her future prediction anyway?
*timewarp*
A physics professor at the MIT gives a seminar at elementary school level with some soft philosophical touch that everything may be deterministic. We don't have any power about what is going on or the universe is purely chaos and completely unpredictable. Of course there is no in between because he is so sad he lost his wife.
They dig the time capsule and the astrophysics professor completely loses it thinking that the girl predicted the future and wrote it down in a numerical code. That reminded me of the documentation about the believer who thought he can predict catastrophes with the Tora's text when reading the letters like a cross-word riddle and the professor showed him that given enough words you can find anything in Tom Sawyer if you search hard (with computers).
But it gets worse. Everything comes true which are just some events left on the list that fit conveniently into ~50 minutes of Hollywood catastrophe movie. It seems like the "plot" was just an excuse for the SpecialFX department to get to work. The effects are impressive, but the events are completely random. It then goes X-Files style with mysterious black men which later become aliens that pick some animals including chosen humans onto a new planet with many explicit allusions to the Christian bible.
The movie ends with some people looting in an apocalyptic setting, father/son reuniting and the sun burning everything down. So what? Aliens mind-controlled the bible writers and keep order in the universe including the fate of every human being? They may sound totally plausible to people thinking Yahweh created the world just for them, every word in an ancient story book is true and they have to pray all the time so he adjusts reality in their favor. For every clear minded individual this is just plain nonsense if not religious propaganda.
Please don't do movies like that. They are not enjoyable at all plus they are spreading pseudo-science and uneducated mysteries. If you hear voices in your head, please consult medical treatment. Aliens will not save you when earth is destroyed. Thank you.
*timewarp*
A physics professor at the MIT gives a seminar at elementary school level with some soft philosophical touch that everything may be deterministic. We don't have any power about what is going on or the universe is purely chaos and completely unpredictable. Of course there is no in between because he is so sad he lost his wife.
They dig the time capsule and the astrophysics professor completely loses it thinking that the girl predicted the future and wrote it down in a numerical code. That reminded me of the documentation about the believer who thought he can predict catastrophes with the Tora's text when reading the letters like a cross-word riddle and the professor showed him that given enough words you can find anything in Tom Sawyer if you search hard (with computers).
But it gets worse. Everything comes true which are just some events left on the list that fit conveniently into ~50 minutes of Hollywood catastrophe movie. It seems like the "plot" was just an excuse for the SpecialFX department to get to work. The effects are impressive, but the events are completely random. It then goes X-Files style with mysterious black men which later become aliens that pick some animals including chosen humans onto a new planet with many explicit allusions to the Christian bible.
The movie ends with some people looting in an apocalyptic setting, father/son reuniting and the sun burning everything down. So what? Aliens mind-controlled the bible writers and keep order in the universe including the fate of every human being? They may sound totally plausible to people thinking Yahweh created the world just for them, every word in an ancient story book is true and they have to pray all the time so he adjusts reality in their favor. For every clear minded individual this is just plain nonsense if not religious propaganda.
Please don't do movies like that. They are not enjoyable at all plus they are spreading pseudo-science and uneducated mysteries. If you hear voices in your head, please consult medical treatment. Aliens will not save you when earth is destroyed. Thank you.
Der Eisbär
(1998)
Cheap German Pulp Fiction Rip-Off
23 January 2013
Warning: Spoilers
The story makes no sense at all. A hired gun has to get stopped from his contract to kill a snitch with a bag of money. He misses his call, gets his job done and for whatever reason he and his agent should be killed now. There is another "plot" involving wiring up a gangster boss car to bomb him, but the car gets stolen. It even has a tracking device installed, but instead of phoning home and asking for the location, the beautiful assassin decides to go into a nearby bar and get drunk where she meets the hit-man who instead of warning his partner that assassins will come for him soon, also decides to get heavily drunk in the same bar. That is it. In fact nothing of importance is happening all the time. The car jackers sub-plot involves driving to a diner to steal hamburgers and is interrupted by their infantile humor. You will see many famous faces of German television who will in the end meet up in a shoot-out including several minutes of angry shouting at each other. The hit-man gets wounded, but is still able to walk away with the girl he just met. Instead of getting to a doctor and survive, they get the money that is still next to the dead snitch and decide to bleed to death on a nameless state road.
The obvious comparison is Pulp Fiction. While the original focuses on absurd humor and violent shoot-outs with great cinematography, this is like the version for 14 year olds joking about penis sizes on the school yard smoking their mild tasting cigarettes. Oops, I just spoilered half of the jokes the actors will narrate. The overacting and the slow pace of the movie make it really annoying to watch. You will see a bar that looks like everywhere else with a group of xenophobic regulars, the rapid transit system of cologne and a no-name diner. This is no way near Tarantino even though it re-enacts parts of other movies all the time. Not even the Mexican standoff in the end is in any way impressive.
Instead of watching this garbage I should have played a mission of Grand Theft Auto. It's storyline would have made much more sense and be way more entertaining. Luckily the protagonists died so there won't be a sequel.
The obvious comparison is Pulp Fiction. While the original focuses on absurd humor and violent shoot-outs with great cinematography, this is like the version for 14 year olds joking about penis sizes on the school yard smoking their mild tasting cigarettes. Oops, I just spoilered half of the jokes the actors will narrate. The overacting and the slow pace of the movie make it really annoying to watch. You will see a bar that looks like everywhere else with a group of xenophobic regulars, the rapid transit system of cologne and a no-name diner. This is no way near Tarantino even though it re-enacts parts of other movies all the time. Not even the Mexican standoff in the end is in any way impressive.
Instead of watching this garbage I should have played a mission of Grand Theft Auto. It's storyline would have made much more sense and be way more entertaining. Luckily the protagonists died so there won't be a sequel.
Tell Your Friends