shooter

This last weekend's DVD was Shooter, starring Mark Wahlberg.

It was okay. I'm not sure I'd go much further than that.

One thing that was really cool about it was that Wahlberg was playing a sniper and they'd clearly done a lot of research about sniping and that whole thing. I mean there was obviously a lot of pure movie stuff in it, but they'd also definitely had a good crack at making it pretty accurate.

But there seemed to be a lot of things that didn't quite work too.

One thing that was odd was everybody seemed to be growling or mumbling, which made it really difficult to hear what they were saying. I think the effect was supposed to be one of making them seem menacing and moody, but instead it just came off as a kind of disinterest.

In the commentary the director kept talking about making a movie like they had in the 70s. I've heard a few people say that of recent films and I'm kinda on the fence as to whether it's a good thing.

Certainly here it didn't really seem to work - it was like everyone was too conscious of that fact. Like they were all thinking "yeah, I'm in the 70s - gotta act like the 70s". So it seemed more like a pastiche of the 70s, rather than a subtle thing.

Another problem was that Wahlberg's character seemed very dull. I don't think this was as a result of bad acting, as such, it was just that that's how Wahlberg had chosen to play him. But because he was the central character that meant I got a little bored of him.

Another major problem was the "bad guys." The bad guys kinda devolved into a bit of a "lol capitalism is evilzors and we likes it!" thing that just didn't seem to sit well. Not that having capitalism (and capitalist pig-dogs) as the bad guys is necessarily a bad thing, it just came across as slightly too obvious, but also as a little simplistic and childish.

They didn't earn it, in other words. If there had been more of Wahlberg's character actively discovering that it was evil capitalist pigs doing it and it had come as a revelation of some sort that may have worked better. But as it was we were just told - especially at one point where you had an almost bond-like bad guy speech.

Which was contradictory - if this is meant to be a gritty 70s chase film, what's with the OTT baddy speech?

Still, as I say, the snipery/actiony bits were entertaining enough.