Hey, look what came in from Netflix
The Kingdom
M'House
DVD
12/28/07
A few years ago Jamee and I went to a horror movie convention just outside of DC and attended one of the panel discussions. I can't remember what the exact topic of discussion was, but at one point one of the panel folks began going on and on about how Psycho was not a horror film because it was a police procedural. Because the police procedural is a specific genre in and of itself and does not qualify as horror. Which means that The Silence of the Lambs is not a horror film. And Seven is not a horror film. And Jaws. Which is bullshit.
The Kingdom is a police procedural and, for the record, not a horror film, though it shares a title with Lars Von Trier's Danish miniseries, which is. (How's that for an awkward transition?) I had wanted to see The Kingdom when it was in theaters, but decided to wait because of the generally average reviews it got and since it only took about three months to hit DVD, that probably wasn't a bad decision, action sequences aside.
It's really not that bad of a standard Hollywood action flick. It's politics are a little simplistic and when it starts the non-stop action in the last thirty minutes it's a little too easy for the good guys to succeed, even with half of the ammunition in Riyadh being fired at them. That's how simplistic this is - you can easily label the characters as good guys or bad guys and the bad guys can get killed by bullets flying through concrete, the good guys are protected from RPGs by, let's say, air.
So, it's cliched, but well executed and the action is good, (not surprising considering this is a Michael Mann production), but nowhere near the level of the bank heist in Heat or the trailer park standoff in Miami Vice. And it's hard to feel a whole lot of sympathy for the good guys, considering that they swagger into a foreign country without any seeming care for customs or modes of behavior. It's almost as though we're supposed to be rooting for them simply because they're Americans.
At least Jason Bateman's character gets taught an important lesson about why it's not a good idea to be a dick to your hosts. It's also funny to see a supposedly crack FBI agent wearing a Pixies t-shirt that to my knowledge was mostly available at Hot Topic, which gave me the impression that he was a poseur who couldn't score tickets to either reunion show in the DC area over the past few years, but I digress.
Anyway, The Kingdom is not awful, and the first have handily labels every place and everybody, so you kinda know who the characters are and where they're at. Which is considerate.
The KingdomM'House
DVD
12/28/07
A few years ago Jamee and I went to a horror movie convention just outside of DC and attended one of the panel discussions. I can't remember what the exact topic of discussion was, but at one point one of the panel folks began going on and on about how Psycho was not a horror film because it was a police procedural. Because the police procedural is a specific genre in and of itself and does not qualify as horror. Which means that The Silence of the Lambs is not a horror film. And Seven is not a horror film. And Jaws. Which is bullshit.
The Kingdom is a police procedural and, for the record, not a horror film, though it shares a title with Lars Von Trier's Danish miniseries, which is. (How's that for an awkward transition?) I had wanted to see The Kingdom when it was in theaters, but decided to wait because of the generally average reviews it got and since it only took about three months to hit DVD, that probably wasn't a bad decision, action sequences aside.
It's really not that bad of a standard Hollywood action flick. It's politics are a little simplistic and when it starts the non-stop action in the last thirty minutes it's a little too easy for the good guys to succeed, even with half of the ammunition in Riyadh being fired at them. That's how simplistic this is - you can easily label the characters as good guys or bad guys and the bad guys can get killed by bullets flying through concrete, the good guys are protected from RPGs by, let's say, air.
So, it's cliched, but well executed and the action is good, (not surprising considering this is a Michael Mann production), but nowhere near the level of the bank heist in Heat or the trailer park standoff in Miami Vice. And it's hard to feel a whole lot of sympathy for the good guys, considering that they swagger into a foreign country without any seeming care for customs or modes of behavior. It's almost as though we're supposed to be rooting for them simply because they're Americans.
At least Jason Bateman's character gets taught an important lesson about why it's not a good idea to be a dick to your hosts. It's also funny to see a supposedly crack FBI agent wearing a Pixies t-shirt that to my knowledge was mostly available at Hot Topic, which gave me the impression that he was a poseur who couldn't score tickets to either reunion show in the DC area over the past few years, but I digress.
Anyway, The Kingdom is not awful, and the first have handily labels every place and everybody, so you kinda know who the characters are and where they're at. Which is considerate.
posted by PunchBuggyBlues at 12:00 PM
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