#2002films

Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever is not only bad, it’s the worst. It’s so boring it's torture. You can’t even have a good time watching this picture and making fun of it. You'll be too busy trying to untangle the nonsensical plot to have any kind of fun. The twists are so obvious that when characters don’t acknowledge each other or act surprised when information is revealed to them you'll assume you missed something, or that you're confusing an actor for another. I can hardly believe it… and it happened to me!

The plot hardly makes any sense but here goes: Michael (Aidan Drummond), the son of the CIA's director (Gregg henry as Robert) is kidnapped by former DIA agent Sever (Lucy Liu). Former FBI agent Jeremiah Ecks (Antonio Banderas) is tasked with taking her out - she won't see his non-DIA tactics coming. Things get more complicated when Ecks realizes Robert has stolen a dangerous nanobot assassin from Russia and probably wants to use it for evil.

This film's title is a misnomer. Ecks and Sever are supposed to figure out that they’re on the same side so they can team up against Robert. Why the name? who knows. If it’s supposed to be a shocking reveal, director Kaos (really making a name for himself with this one) and writers Alan B. McElroy and Peter M. Lenkov have made a twist that's just a straight line. It’s so obvious from the beginning that Robert is evil that no human being wouldn't see it coming.

The plot ludicrous developments are abundant. Ecks and Robert were romantic rivals once upon a time. Ecks was married to Vinn (Talisa Soto). Robert wanted her too. When the movie begins, Vinn is married to Robert. How? Apparently, Robert tricked them both into thinking the other was dead so Vinn could get his slimy paws on the later. Who wrote this? A random plot generator? And that’s not even a major plot point or anything. It’s a detail meant to enrich this world. Can you imagine what cinematic madness goes once the espionage and guns actually kick in?

To match the jumbled plot we have some of the worst acting from professionals I've ever seen. If I didn’t know any better, I would've sworn they used a Lucy Liu mannequin on set and that her dialogue was recorded from a studio months later during an apocalyptic hangover. It’s as if she’s embarrassed and channeling all her energy in the hopes she'll turn invisible. In any other movie, Banderas would look like the worst actor of all time, but in here he actually looks kind of good because everyone around him sucks so much.

I knew what I was getting into. Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever is considered “one of the worst movies ever made”. I imagined this would make it a fun watch with friends. I couldn’t have been more wrong. Every mind-numbing explosion, every pointlessly shot bullet, and brain-melting nonsensical development inflated our boredom. I don’t understand it. It’s as if we saw a cursed film; one that drains the life force of everyone in and around it.

Take this movie, and blast it to smithereens with a gun. Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever is 91 agonizing minutes of anti-fun. You might not believe it's as bad as they say. Believe me, it’s worse! I don't need to see every movie in the world to know this must be the worst theatrically-released action flick ever made. (On DVD, March 27, 2015)

It's easy to see what makes Equilibrium appealing to some but this dystopian action film has a fatal flaw that unfortunately cripples it beyond repair. It's a lot less intelligent than it thinks it is.

Set after a third world war in the early 21st century, cleric John Preston (Christian Bale) is part of an elite task force charged with taking down “sense offenders”. In this future, emotions are outlawed and people repress them using medication. When an accident at home causes Preston to miss a dose, he becomes a sense offender himself.

You see what the film's trying to do. Artwork, music, poetry, fiction, love, basically anything creative, anything that could arouse emotion or derived from emotion is outlawed. Unfortunately, the set and costume designers couldn't help themselves and didn't quite commit. If the people of this dystopia were truly determined to eliminate everything associated with emotions, then everyone’s clothes should be the same, every building should look the same, every surface should have the same texture and color. On paper, this wouldn't be an issue but in a movie, you've got to overlook a lot. Let's say you do. Even then, you spot flaws right away. This entire civilization depends on self-medication and it only takes one missed dose to send cracks throughout the system. We've seen similar scenarios work elsewhere, which is probably the issue. This is not a novel idea and the execution isn't smart enough to make us forgive this fact.

Not helping are the performances. Everyone's too good! I’ve seen plenty of awful actors that would have been perfect for the roles of emotionless, robot-like workers in a society that oppresses all feelings. Instead, Kurt Wimmer employs men and women who can’t not emote. No one should be delivering a wink or a smile after that one-liner, or screaming as they’re about to die. I hate to hang onto this point for so long but this is where a simple re-write would've done wonders. Instead of no emotion, just say they're severely suppressed.

You wonder why someone could enjoy the film? Because of the action. The moves our supercop displays while apprehending criminals is truly awesome. Gunshots are merged with martial arts in a spectacular and unique genre of combat - gun kata. When you see it in action, you forget about everything that rubbed you the wrong way previously. It isn’t just one big fight towards the end either. There are numerous action sequences throughout and they’re nicely varied.

Equilibirum suffers from flaws that are hard to overlook. If you're the kind of person that can be dazzled with cool fighting sequences and the idea of becoming the guy that might topple the fascist regime single-handedly entices you so much that you won’t be able to even think of the illogical bits, then you'll go nuts for this film. In that sense, I can recommend it, but only to a select audience. For everyone else, Equilibrium gets a middle-of-the-road rating, a 2,5/5. (On Blu-ray, February 7, 2015)