Product Description
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During an historic counter-terrorism summit in Spain,
the President of the United States is struck down by an
assassin's bullet. Eight strangers have a perfect view of the
kill, but what did they really see? As the minutes leading up to
the al are replayed through the eyes of each eyewitness,
the reality of the assassination takes shape. But just when you
think you know the answer, the shattering final truth is
revealed. VANTAGE POINT is a mindbending political
action-thriller starring Dennis Quaid, Matthew Fox, Academy
Award® Winner Forest Whitaker (Best Actor 2006, The Last King of
Scotland), with Sigourney Weaver and Academy Award® winner
William Hurt (Best Actor 1985, Kiss of the Spider Woman).
.com
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Vantage Point, which aspires to be a cunningly twisted
thriller, comes equipped with plenty of hurtling action, handheld
camerawork, what-was-that? editing, and a plot that has multiple,
contradictory agendas writhing like a nest of snakes. It's all
set a-boil within a few blocks of a town square in Spain where a
U.S. President is targeted for assassination. Although the movie
lasts 90 minutes, the events it depicts are mostly over with in a
quarter-hour or so--but seen, rewound, and reseen from half a
dozen different (you guessed it) vantage points. The first line
in the credits reads "Original Film," apparently the name of the
production company. "Gimmick Movie" would be more accurate; the
opening reel, effectively jolting, affords an initial overview of
the events through the eyes, lenses, monitors, and dueling
sensibilities of a TV news producer (Sigourney Weaver), her
activist-minded reporter (Zoe Saldana) and crew. Everybodys in
Salamanca (actually, Mexico City) for the start of an
international conference to reaffirm Arab-Western commitment to
the fight against terrorism. Terrorism, of course, sees this as
an ideal moment to break out. As s and explosions reduce
everything to chaos, the clock is reset to zero and we proceed to
revisit the scene as experienced by several Secret Service agents
(namely Dennis Quaid and Matthew Fox), an American tourist with
camcorder (Forest Whitaker), sundry locals--including three who
may be caught up in a love triangle or a conspiracy or both--and
even the President himself (William Hurt).
For a while, this is mildly diverting: that guy, or that
gesture, so sinister when glimpsed across the plaza in one
run-through, now appears harmless in close-up--or vice versa. But
there's no real ambiguity (so stop with the careless comparisons
to Kurosawa's omon)--this is a shell game in which the peas
aren't worth tracking. Despite decent actors, the characters
might as well be holograms (although poor Forest Whitaker is
saddled with "motivation" of surpassing sappiness), and the
casting telegraphs several twists: one redoubtable good guy
practically gives a wink-wink, nudge-nudge that he's really bad,
etc. The movie declines to specify which nutjob philosophy the
terrorists espouse, and their numbers are multi-ethnic. There's
also a laborious suggestion that they have bloodthirsty,
reactionary counterparts among the President's inner circle,
which perhaps qualifies as redeeming socio-political comment and
prompts a meaningless declaration of deep meaning from the Prez.
The whole megilleh finally comes down to an extended car chase
through impassably claustrophobic streets that would mark a lurch
into unintentional self-parody--if only that point hadn't been
passed a couple of rewinds earlier. --Richard T. Jameson
Stills from Vantage Point (click for larger image)
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