Encrypt

As the "other writer" on this project, let me give a few of you an eduction on the wonderful world of TV production. While the original screenplay Encrypt, written by Richard Taylor, was solid, it was written as a big movie. At a studio level, it would have been budgeted between $60-80 million. On an independent level, it probably would have cost around $10 million. The original movies for the Sci-fi channel are budgeted at $2 million, which after above the line costs (actors, directors, writers, producers), it's actually considerably less. Obviously, for this kind of money, the production quality on every level is going to be less than your standard Fox movie of the week. Secondly, this is a TV MOVIE, which means it has to fit into a formula predetermined by the network by past successes (i.e. commercial breaks every twenty minutes, and a structure that leaves cliff hangers before every break). It has an "episodic feel" because it is episodic TV. And for this genre, that means action beats with a body count. That means adding a team. Now, while the character development for the team members clearly didn't work, some of that was due to casting (Torontonian actors don't seem to "get" the American commando stuff), and a last minute order to "cut one character" riddled the piece with lost lines and lost moments. Lastly, (and we go back to the budget for this one), everything has to take place in one or two locations (moving around is costly), which means you usually end up forcing your set-pieces into whatever rooms are available at your primary location. As a result, things feel less organic than they should. That being said, Encrypt was better received than the few readers here have commented. The director did tremendous things within the limitations given him and both Grant and Vivian grounded the film with strong, emotional performances. Could the movie have been better? Sure. But given the time, budgetary and other constraints, the efforts put forth by many deserves a little more respect, especially given all of their good intentions.

While Encrypt was watchable due to its ok production quality, the feeling this left me with was just how low quality the plot was and that this production was just made for the sake of making a sci-fi production.

The challenges faced by the protagonists during the show seemed like they were inserted just to pad out its length. In addition they weren't generally very interesting or convincing as actually being much of a challenge except to serve as an excuse to remove cast members. While the ending and direction of the storyline were moderately interesting, what role various cast members were going to play was pretty predictable given their shallow dialog and tacky names.

How on earth dreck written as badly as this actually gets made I have to wonder.

I'm a big fan of camp, but when every plot 'twist' is predictable and bad, while obviously not trying to be, even I lose interest. I was going to rate this a 3, but the ending dropped it a point easily. Its only saving grace is that I hated other movies more. Not enough beer in the world for this one.

A user comment by Roger Tay states: "How on earth does dreck written as badly as this actually get made?" Well Roger, let me explain.

This was an original script and I happen to know the screenwriter on this project, (God I love living in L.A.). I read the script way before it was produced. This is not what was written. Producers, and there are many on a project, try to dance around each other making changes to justify their existence.

When enough changes are made, the producers bring in another writer who knows nothing of the original intent of the writer and tries not only to make the lame changes the producers want, but will do his/her best to change at least 51% of the script in order to share a full "screenplay by" credit on the project. And that's how this was re-written.

So, to answer your question.... you take a bunch of 30 year olds who know how to dress but know nothing about story telling and give them a decent script to destroy.

I have definitely seen worse movies than Encrypt. From the premise it seemed intriguing, but for some reason(maybe it was the fact that it was a low-budget TV movie) I was also dubious as to if it would be as good. It isn't quite, but it is not a complete waste of a good concept either. For instance, for a low-budget TV movie it actually looks quite good. The editing is crisper than I was expecting, the settings do at least have some atmosphere and the special effects are above average, not outstanding but not crude or artificial. There is only one exception, which was the robot that looked as though it would be more at home in the 30s, even then it was nowhere near as bad as special effects for other low-budget TV movies I've seen recently. The music has a suitably haunting quality, not over-bearing or sluggish-sounding. The acting is also above average, especially from Vivian Wu who is radiant and has a certain command, nobody's absolutely outstanding but again there is nobody terrible at the same time. The story also has points of interest, the psychological games between Wu and the hero are very intriguing especially. On the other hand, there are other scenes that do feel as though they were there for padding, consequently the pace drags at times. The ending also underwhelms, not in a rushed or abrupt sort of way but it did seem a little too easy and contrived for my liking. The dialogue is not as cheesy or as stilted as I feared, but it is rather talky with too-episodic a structure which drags Encrypt further. The characters are less stereotypical than you'd think but underdeveloped, and I really didn't see the need for a villain. All in all, not bad but at the same time I didn't care for it. 5/10 Bethany Cox