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Lithigin
Reviews
Ultraviolet (2006)
Hot body, not much else going on
Ultraviolet was embarrassingly terrible on so many levels. My husband and I usually really dig the comic book and action movies, so I think that our expectations were reasonable for the genre. The kinds of movies that Ultraviolet tried to channel were X-Men, The Matrix and Underworld. Unfortunately, this movie failed to do so.
1) Dialogue was laughably bad. One of Milla's lines was actually "Because these beautiful moments turn evil when they're over." What?? This was regarding a romantic pass made at her. Totally incongruous with the setting. 2) Excessive use of CGI is a personal irritant. Additionally, the motorcycle chase scenes were only one step above TRON. I might as well have been watching my 11 year old neighbors play some video game. 3) Zero character development. I didn't care about Violet, the french guy, the scientist guy, the pretty boy, or the evil nose filter guy. I didn't care about their individual goals (mainly because they weren't very clear). I didn't care about characters dying, and I didn't care about the revelation at the end; the only indicator that I had that it was important was her somewhat awed reaction.
To be fair, Milla Jovovich has an incredible face and body and is well-suited for fight scenes. If all-CGI, all-the-time is your thing, then you'll be thrilled with the loads of glossed-over fight scenes involving Milla and hordes of green screen baddies. If you're like our entire theater, you're bored. Really, fake fights just don't impress me.
The Order (2003)
What a misleading trailer!
My husband and I thoroughly expected to enjoy The Order (despite general opinion), based on the preview and our love for thriller/horror/action/disturbing movies. What a disappointment! This movie was totally different from what the previews foretold. We re-watched the trailer after seeing the movie and there were at least 3 scenes in the trailer that weren't in the movie at all. Creative editing led potential viewers to think the movie was much more exciting than it turned out to be. There were strings of unfulfilled leads and un-revealing 'revelations.' At the end, we were left with so many loose ends that we wondered if the DVD was faulty and had skipped over what we had expected to see. I should note also that my husband was a Catholic for 20 years and so has a pretty solid historical and mythical knowledge of the subject matter of the movie. Confounding points:
---VERY MILD SPOILERS--- *There is lots of talk about how Alex had special gifts relating to the seeking out of demons and such - let's see a flashback scene, at least! I had hoped that they would play this up and convince the viewers that he was in fact unusual. The only sign that we have of Alex having a second sight or whatever is what is told to us. *So Mara tried to kill him at her own exorcism? Uh, why? How? And they only put her into a mental institution for a year? (You might think this is a spoiler, but not so - it's nearly irrelevant to the plot, which further strengthens my frustration, as this would usually be a strong plot point) *Mara wangles her way into coming to Rome by saying something to the effect of "You'll need me while you're there, and you know it." We thus anticipated that she would have some sort of pivotal situational role where she saves someone from something evil. Again, not so. She was important once, but not in a way that she or Alex would have expected. *All of a sudden, when faced with a decision, Alex declines the opportunity because he is in love with Mara. What?? The only indication we had of this prior was that A) she is the only woman in the main characters, and B) that Tommy had suggested as much to Alex previously, which Alex has always denied with no acting or emotion to indicate otherwise. There hadn't been an iota of affection between them before, and here they are in love and sacrificing all for each other. Not very convincing.
*Towards the end, Tommy finds a bit of parchment, reads it, and says "It's a trick!" It turns out that what he has discovered is not a surprise to most viewers, as we had thought that his "discovery" had already happened (in the scene with Mara under the window). I think this was supposed to be an important plot twist, but it only resulted in a reaction of "Oh, that is meant to be big news?" from us. By the way, why would he have been given this second piece of parchment? This makes no sense. *Who are these "dying" people that we see twice? Are they members of the underground order? Prisoners? I'm also not aware of any mythology that suggests that dying people make correct demonic-sounding prophecies. *The use of sparrows as harbingers of death/evil is a known technique, but was used very erratically. The scene where Alex deposes some "demon spawn" is very mechanical, and these characters appear periodically with very little purpose. They are creepy, certainly, but add nothing to the plot.
All in all, The Order began and ended flatly. An hour and a half into the movie, we were still waiting for something significant to happen, and at the conclusion, we looked at each other and immediately spouted out all of the inconsistencies and unfulfilled potentials that I listed above. See it if you must, but expect to be disappointed.