Posts Tagged ‘CIA’

Short Take: Decently entertaining, but largely disappointing

Director: Sylvester Stallone (Rambo)

Screenwriters: Dave Callaham (Doom), Sylvester Stallone (Rocky franchise)

Cast: Sylvester Stallone (Rocky Balboa), Jason Satham (Crank: High Voltage), Jet Li (The Forbidden Kingdom), Giselle Itie, Eric Roberts (The Dark Knight), Dolph Lundgren (Rocky IV), Mickey Rourke (Iron Man 2), Terry Crews (Idiocracy), Randy Couture, Steve Austin (The Longest Yard)

Length: 1h 43m

Synopsis: A group of mercenaries are offered a job by the CIA to kill a warlord that has taken over the island country of Vilena. The mercenaries know that the CIA is hiring them instead of doing the dirty work themselves because if things would happen to go wrong then news of the fact that an ex-CIA agent was part of the warlord’s inner circle would leak out. Meanwhile, in the process of tackling this thorny mission the mercenaries get entangled with a woman who is part of the island’s underground resistance against the warlord, and as it turns out her predicament is far more personal than they could have known. Despite lacking confidence that they can succeed in this tremendous undertaking by themselves the mercenaries decide to take the moral high ground and do the dutiful. Now all they have to do is survive. Read the rest of this entry »

Short Take: The tagline reads "Who is Salt?" - but does the movie even know?

Director: Phillip Noyce (The Bone Collector)

Screenwriter: Kurt Wimmer (Law Abiding Citizen)

Cast: Angelina Jolie (Wanted, Changeling), Liev Schreiber (Repo Men), Chiwetel Ejiofor (2012, Serenity)

Length: 1h 40m

Synopsis: Evelyn Salt (Jolie) is a CIA operative who was recently rescued from captivity in North Korea. She has a husband, a distinguished career profile, and is looking forward to celebrating her wedding anniversary. Before officially clocking out the night of, however, her superiors ask that she interrogate a man who could possibly be a Russian spy. During the interrogation the man pegs Salt as also being a Russian spy by saying she was his contact in the United States. Not taking chances, the CIA tries to hold Salt but she gets away, leading them on a wild chase that they hope will reveal exactly which side she’s fighting for. Read the rest of this entry »

Short Take: Pretty solid all around, though Cruise' playful attitude towards the material makes the film

Director: James Mangold (3:10 to Yuma, Walk the Line)

Screenwriter: Patrick O’Neill (Début Film)

Cast: Tom Cruise (Tropic Thunder, Mission Impossible III), Cameron Diaz (Shrek Forever After, My Sister’s Keeper), Peter Sarsgaard (Orphan, An Education) Paul Dano (Taking Woodstock, There Will Be Blood)

Length: 1 hour 50 minutes

Synopsis: June Havens (Diaz) meets Roy Miller (Cruise), seemingly by accident, when they bump into each other at the airport.  June and Roy end up on the same flight and start a casual flirtation.  Things take a turn for the dangerous when Roy kills everyone else on the near-empty flight explaining that he’s a CIA agent on the lam because he stole a valuable new invention called the Zephyr.  June’s involvement with Roy puts her in danger and he insists that she must trust him in order to survive.  However, everything from Roy’s unpredictable behavior to the appearance of FBI Agent Fitzgerald (Sarsgaard) leads June to question Roy’s sincerity.  As June and Roy encounter ever more dangerous scenarios, she must decide whether Roy is endangering her life or protecting it. Read the rest of this entry »

Short Take: Fun, but ultimately superficial

Director: Sylvain White (Stomp the Yard)

Screenwriters: Peter Berg (Very Bad Things), James Vanderbilt (Zodiac, Basic)

Cast: Jeffrey Dean Morgan (Taking Woodstock, Watchmen), Zoe Saldana (Avatar, Star Trek), Chris Evans (Sunshine), Jason Patric (Narc)

Length: 1h 38m

Synopsis: A smoking aces U.S. special ops team gets double-crossed during a routine mission in Bolivia, and as a result they get the blame for the deaths of over two dozen innocent children. After faking their deaths to escape the CIA they work towards finding a way to get back to the states, but money is tight and options are limited. Opportunity finally knocks in the form of a mysterious woman with wealth, connections, and a serious attitude. Once back in America the group makes it a point to hunt down the person(s) responsible for framing them. Read the rest of this entry »

Zoe Saldana ("Avatar," "Star Trek") in Warner Bros.' "The Losers" - Opens April 23rd

IGN.com published a set visit article yesterday about their trip to Puerto Rico where Warner Bros. is currently filming The Losers, based on the Vertigo graphic novels of the same name. The high-octane action film is being directed by Sylvain White (Stomp the Yard) and stars Jeffrey Dean Morgan (Watchmen), Zoe Saldana (Avatar), and Chris Evans (Sunshine).

The story is about a former CIA black ops team that got double-crossed and tries to get revenge. The part of that story that IGN walked in on is the ending, which according to the article will supposedly entail a plethora of gunfire (naturally). Grasping the tone and style of the film was not easy for some of those involved, apparently because the story mixes moments of sincere drama with one-liners and gags. Chris Evans explains how he first reacted to the script.

“I just knew that Peter Berg wrote it, it was Warner Bros., it was a war-type movie,” Evans recalls. “And by page 20 I was a little confused as to what they were going for. Because there were a lot of jokes. There were times of high drama, shootouts and someone’s cracking a line. And I said, ‘What is this?’ Because I think nowadays we want … Bourne Identity . You want very raw, very real, very authentic stuff. And the days of the Die Hards and Lethal Weapons, those movies where there was room for some humor, you don’t see a lot of them. So I put the script down on page 30 and I called my agent and I said, ‘What is this? What am I missing? I’ve got to go back and start over and get the right tone in my head. I’m not thinking clearly on it.’ And he said, ‘This is Joel Silver. It’s based on a graphic novel. Why don’t you read the graphic novel first, then crack the script?’ So I went back and started over and it made a whole lot more sense. And I really, actually thought, ‘You know what? There’s room for this.’” – movies.IGN.com

The article as a whole provides a number of details, none of which would likely be considered spoiling. Those details, though, are mostly on the level of tidbits, failing to indicate much besides how difficult it is to shoot an action movie. As someone who still has yet to look into the graphic novel series, a rudimentary exploration into any of the characters or discussion with the director about what he’s aiming to accomplish would have helped. Besides these shortcomings it should prove to be an interesting read for those anticipating the release of The Losers, which opens April 23rd.