Vantage Point

Man it is getting harder and harder for me to see movies anymore. After begging and pleading with my wife I was allowed to, for a few hours, go and see a movie. I grabbed my good friend Ori and we decided on the action/drama Vantage Point. If you've seen the commercials and read some of the buzz you'll know that Vantage Point is structured a little differently from your average action film. It's an Assassination attempt from seven or eight different perspectives. So going into this thing you have to be prepared to see the same event over and over again, albeit from different angles, but if you aren't prepared for it the film can feel a little repetitious.I personally liked the approach and really thought it was cool how they shot it. The film revolves around a conference in Spain where the President is giving a major speech about terrorism. The President is shot and there are two explosions that engulf the square into chaos. We get to see the event unfold from the news crew to the agents who protect the President, to an American Civilian watching from the crowd, to a local man who may or may not be involved in the plot, and to the terrorist or terrorists themselves. Even the President gets his own viewpoint on the event. Each perspective provides us with a clue to figuring out the plot. Now it's important to realize that at the end of the day this is just a clever action flick. We don't get any backstory on the terrorists or even the President himself. It's fairly cut and dried you have bad people who want to kill the President and the agents have to figure out who they are and what they are up to. Agent Barnes (Denis Quaid) has already taken a bullet for the President and it's up to him to figure out who the shooter is. He's backed up by fellow agent Taylor (Matthew Fox). Forrest Whitaker plays the hapless American Tourist who catches the event on his camera. Whitaker plays it pretty low key. After you get the different angles then the action gets ramped up to a very electrifying chase sequence through the streets of Madrid.It's a great supporting cast too by the way Sigourney Weaver, William Hurt, Bruce McGill, Edgar Ramirez, Said Taghmaoui, Ayalet Zurer, Eduardo Noriega and Zoe Saldana. You had a good blend of American and International stars especially the very sexy Ayalet Zurer who's technically Israeli royalty. Overall Vantage Point is an enjoyable movie with a few twists and turns, some are a little too obvious but like I said it was a very cool concept and I felt that Director Pete Travis juggled them pretty well.

Grade 4 Buckets