Mojotronica
Expect Irony.
For me it's the movie "The Rock." I actually liked "Con Air" -- and even "Armageddon" -- better.
Why? Because I thought that "The Rock" made no sense. Ed Harris had a good plan in place to extract $80M. The money was available, as it was in a slush fund hidden away somewhere. Gov't analysts were privy to Harris' backgorund and motivation. Did it make any sense that he would follow through on his threat to kill much of the population of SF if his demand was met?
No. Not to me, and not to a gov't analyst.
So instead, they send in the Navy SEALs, who promptly get gunned down by Harris' team. Probably $12M in training investment just losing those men. $80M is nothing, compared to those lives.
Sean Connery is great, but they didn't give him enough to do. Mostly just a tricky jailbreak and a little banter. The SF chase scene was (yawn) nothing new. An indulgence for the Director -- did nothing to advance the plot.
In the end, Harris blinked -- he was not villainous enough to kill all those people -- so the writer had to make his men villainous enough to murder him and attempt to follow through on it.
At least in Con Air the villains were truly villainous, w/ no redeeming qualities. If their plan succeeds, innocents die. Same goes for the amoral meteor in Armageddon.
Compare also to the plot Die Hard, where complying w/ Hans Gruber's request would result in the deaths of all those people. "The Rock" drove me crazy because I was so looking forward to it and found the logic of the movie completely fell apart, even in the broadest, high-concept movie terms...
Why? Because I thought that "The Rock" made no sense. Ed Harris had a good plan in place to extract $80M. The money was available, as it was in a slush fund hidden away somewhere. Gov't analysts were privy to Harris' backgorund and motivation. Did it make any sense that he would follow through on his threat to kill much of the population of SF if his demand was met?
No. Not to me, and not to a gov't analyst.
So instead, they send in the Navy SEALs, who promptly get gunned down by Harris' team. Probably $12M in training investment just losing those men. $80M is nothing, compared to those lives.
Sean Connery is great, but they didn't give him enough to do. Mostly just a tricky jailbreak and a little banter. The SF chase scene was (yawn) nothing new. An indulgence for the Director -- did nothing to advance the plot.
In the end, Harris blinked -- he was not villainous enough to kill all those people -- so the writer had to make his men villainous enough to murder him and attempt to follow through on it.
At least in Con Air the villains were truly villainous, w/ no redeeming qualities. If their plan succeeds, innocents die. Same goes for the amoral meteor in Armageddon.
Compare also to the plot Die Hard, where complying w/ Hans Gruber's request would result in the deaths of all those people. "The Rock" drove me crazy because I was so looking forward to it and found the logic of the movie completely fell apart, even in the broadest, high-concept movie terms...
