Movie Review: Equilibrium

TITLE: Equilibrium

STATS: U.S. RATING: R RUN TIME: 107 min GENRE: Action/Drama/Sci-fi DATE: 2/26/2003 COMPANY: Dimension Films LANGUAGE: English

MY SUMMARY: In a post-World War III world, the government has decided that the cause of violence and war is human emotion and thus has banned it. Within this strict totalitarian government is a branch of law keepers known as Clerics, the top-ranking being John Preston. After Preston misses his scheduled dose of the emotion-blocking drug Prozium, he discovers the ability to feel. The underground resistance has learned of this and has recruited him to take down the government.

IMDB SUMMARY: In a futuristic world, a strict regime has eliminated war by suppressing emotions: books, art and music are strictly forbidden and feeling is a crime punishable by death. Cleric John Preston (Bale) is a top ranking government agent responsible for destroying those who resist the rules. When he misses a dose of Prozium, a mind-altering drug that hinders emotion, Preston, who has been trained to enforce the strict laws of the new regime, suddenly becomes the only person capable of overthrowing it.

DIRECTOR: Kurt Wimmer

ACTORS: Christian Bale, William Fichtner, Angus Macfadyen, Taye Diggs, Emily Watson, Sean Pertwee, Matthew Harbour

MY RATING: 7 out of 10

ROTTEN TOMATOES RATING: 36%

MOVIEFONE RATING:  2 out of 5 stars

ROGER EBERT RATING: 3 out of 5 stars

THE GOOD: This movie is a mixture of the novels “1984” and “Brave New World” and the movie “The Matrix”, just without some of the more interesting camera shots. However, even without the incredible special effects of some blockbuster sci-fi movies, many of the fights and the new type of martial arts made for the movie, the “gun kata”, are really cool and don’t need special effects to make you notice. The movie also leaves hints and clues throughout about who is a “sense offender” and by the end of the movie, you notice these hints. It makes the movie a little more interesting and fun. Although this isn’t an incredibly great film, I’d recommend it to anyone. The movie actually carries a message much like the novels mentioned above, but incorporates them in a more contemporary setting. So far, everyone I have recommended this movie to has enjoyed it.

THE BAD: Because this movie didn’t have the budget of many of the high profile blockbusters, some of the special effects are pretty cheesy. A few of the fights are cheesy as well, but they didn’t bother me nearly as bad as some of the effects. However, the worst thing that always upsets me is that the ending seems rushed. The battle to get to Dupont seems too easy, the worst fight being with Brandt. After all that smack-talk and even showing his skills earlier in the movie against Preston, he gets taken down way too easily. The fight with Dupont is okay, but still a little too quickly ended. Other than that, the rest leading up to these fights is really good in my opinion.

FUN FACTS:  The inspiration for the cityscapes and the design of Libria come mainly from the works of Hugh Ferriss, an early 20th century conceptual artist Despite popular belief, absolutely no wires were used in the film at all. All of the gravity-defying stunts were done through conventional means. For example, the back flip off of the motorcycle was done with a trampoline John Preston kills 118 characters in this movie, which makes him responsible for exactly half of the total 236 deaths shown. As of 2009, he continues to hold the 3rd place record for most deaths in a movie caused by one character

WORD OCCURS WORD OCCURS A** 0 RACIAL FOR AFRICAN-AMERICAN 0 A**H**E 0 B*****D 0 RACIAL FOR HISPANIC 0 B**CH 0 C*** 0 RACIAL FOR ASIAN 0 D**N 2 F*** 1 RACIAL FOR CAUCASSIAN 0 G**D*** 1 H**L 0 RACIAL FOR OTHER 0 M*****F****R 0 S**T 2 LORD'S NAME IN VAIN 0 * These numbers are as accurate as possible, but some mistakes may be present. This is to give a general idea of the vulgarity and not to represent a precise measurement system.