The first sign that this was going to have a rocky start was when they cut the length of the film to 93 minutes. The next major worry was when Fox refused to allow prescreenings to critics. The final nail in this movie's coffin comes from the director himself...
It's not often that you hear a director bad mouthing his own movie before it opens States-side, but today comes one of those exceptions.
French helmer Matieu Kassovitz ("La Haine," "Gothika") tells AMCTV that didn't have a very good time making "Babylon A.D.", the Vin Diesel sci-fi thriller opening this week.
He tells the site that "I never had a chance to do one scene the way it was written or the way I wanted it to be. The script wasn't respected. Bad producers, bad partners, it was a terrible experience."
Why did he do it then? "The scope of the original book was quite amazing. "The author was very much into geopolitics and how the world is going to evolve. He saw that as wars evolve, it won't be just about territories any more, but money-driven politics. As a director it's something that's very attractive to do."
Yet all that political subtext doesn't show up in the final film - "It's pure violence and stupidity. All the action scenes had a goal: They were supposed to be driven by either a metaphysical point of view or experience for the characters... instead parts of the movie are like a bad episode of 24."
He places the blame squarely on distributor 20th Century Fox - "Fox was sending lawyers who were only looking at all the commas and the dots. They made everything difficult from A to Z." What pushed him over the edge though was the re-editing of the film the studio did to bring it down to 93 minutes - "I should have chosen a studio that has guts. Fox was just trying to get a PG-13 movie. I'm ready to go to war against them, but I can't because they don't give a shit."
DAMN, thats one nasty slamming of his own movie.
Only seen self critique this bad twice before. First when Ole Bornedal (danish director, made a danish movie called Night Watch, and was director of the english one) after making the US remake of Night Watch had such trouble with the studio controlling everything that he refused to work with Hollywood again, and then of course Halle Berrys razzie award where she had the guts to apologize for Catwoman.
"Terrorism is the war of the poor, and war is the terrorism of the rich"
This wasn't the worst movie I've ever seen. Characters were pretty unlikeable (except Vin Diesel, but I always root for him because he reminds me of my brother), and the story was convoluted and poorly explained. I still thought it was better than Vantage Point, which is the last really awful movie I saw in theaters.
Yeah, I was curious as to Vantage Point being "really awful". I watched it recently and while I don't think it should win any oscars, I wasn't angry that I watched it or anything.
"It's like these guys take pride in being ignorant."- Barack Obama
I got really bored seeing the same scenes over and over in Vantage Point. I know that was part of the premise, but a lot of the scenes weren't good enough for me to want to see them multiple times. I would place it below Babylon AD, but that's my opinion. Also, I kind of hate Dennis Quaid.
Seeing as you're a fellow Vin Diesel lover, how would you compare this to other Vin Diesel works? such as xXx, Pitch Black, Chronicles of Riddick, etc.
miir wrote:I'm a bit embarrassed about being a Vin Diesel fan.
I'll see this movie regardless of the reviews. I even saw A Man Apart in the theatres.
Haha, I could have typed this myself. Though I will always be fond of that movie because it started a tradition with my friends of standing up and clapping in theaters during the opening credits, when Vin Diesel comes on.
Syenye wrote:It wasn't as good as Pitch Black/Chronicles of Riddick, but at least it didn't have Paul Walker.
Amen. I take it you are unexcited for "The Fast and The Furious?"
I could see the potential of a half decent movie but so little regarding the backstory (NOTHING) was explained that I was just scratching my head trying to figure out what the fuck was going on.
The editing/butchering turned this into a sub-par action movie.
I've got 99 problems and I'm not dealing with any of them - Lay-Z
I just watched this and I have to say that I enjoyed it. I too would have liked to have seen more of a back story on this or at least something leading up to the current state of things. I think they tried doing this here and there within the story but not as much as I would have liked. There were some cool techy type things though like the road map.
Man, that was not a good movie. I liked the action and special effects and such (except for maybe the snowmobile stunt/chase scene), but they killed the plot of that movie. I'd be interested to see the director allowed to play out his vision, it looked like it could have had a lot of potential.
I'd probably say not to bother watching this, unless you're terribly bored.
"It's like these guys take pride in being ignorant."- Barack Obama
I just watched it tonight on Showtime or whatever. I agree with what everybody else has already said. I would really like to see the version the director wanted create, instead of the one the studio decided to put out.
The version I watched was a disorganized mess, with a back story that could have been interesting if it had actually been given any screen time.
"Our problems are man-made, therefore they may be solved by man. No problem of human destiny is beyond human beings." - John F Kennedy
