|
|
 |
Echelon Conspiracy
R1 - America - Paramount Home Entertainment Review written by and copyright: Ethan C. Stevenson (9th August 2009). |
|
The Film
 I said in my review of the "The Soloist" (2009) that good films are sometimes poorly marketed. After watching "Echelon Conspiracy" I’ve realized something: it seems the same can be said for terrible films too. Ask even the most movie-wise film fan in-the-know what "Echelon Conspiracy" is and I wouldn’t be surprised if they stared at you with a blank face (if they do by now know what it is, hopefully they’ll tell you the truth: that it sucks). If the amount of people that have even heard of this movie is a miniscule sum (and it is), then the amount of people who saw it in theaters is even smaller. Yes, this pile of garbage was actually in theaters – for a week. 400 theaters actually – and it made $500,000 during those 5 days. Simple arithmetic will tell you that is, assuming everything is constant, (in reality nothing is: well, perhaps except gravity and the crumminess of "Echelon Conspiracy" – but that’s not the point) merely $250 per-day, per-theater. Too much if you ask me: this film is not deserving of even those few ticket sales. The plot is far too convoluted and ridiculous to describe (watch as I try to make sense of it all below). That is, assuming the film has its own plot – which, really, it doesn’t. Rather "Echelon Conspiracy" is a mishmash of story elements taken from other, better movies. One part "Eagle Eye" (2008) (the fact that I consider tripe like "Eagle Eye" better than something tells you just how horrible this movie really is), another part "Enemy of the State" (1998) and sharing plot points from various other movies too (both conspiracy related and not) it’s a wonder that someone, somewhere during production didn’t say, “Wait, I’ve seen this before.” (On second thought – with the amount of remakes currently put into production by Hollywood hot-shots; perhaps not). The jumble of a plot goes like this: Max Peterson (Shane West), a computer security technician receives a mysterious package containing a futuristic cell phone upon returning to his hotel room. He immediately opens the box, turns the phone on and begins receiving text messages: Max, of course, instantly obeys whatever the phone tells him. Extending his stay in Bangkok another day, it seems the phone is looking out for his best interests – you see, the plane Peterson was supposed to be on blew up on take off (hey, that’s kind of like the beginning of "Final Destination" (2000)). The phone next gives our lead character a suggestion; instead of going home… how about a trip to Prague? The land of crappy acting. Once there he heads to a casino and, at the suggestion of the phone, starts to gamble: again the cell proves how ‘not evil’ it is – Max wins lots of money. So much money in fact that Head of Casino Security, John Reed (Edward Burns) begins to take interest in this ‘lucky’ American. Side note; Edward Burns (man of little talent and famous for his uncanny ability to consistently appear in truly horrible films) once made a movie in Prague, based on a short story written by Ray Bradbury called "A Sound of Thunder" (2005): don’t watch it – it’s even worse than "Echelon Conspiracy" (to be fair, not by much, but still…) and that’s saying something. Anyway, the story continues on ridiculously with the appearance of Special Agent Dave Grant (Ving Rhames), an FBI agent (in bizarro-world, the place "Echelon Conspiracy" takes place in apparently, the FBI is the highest authority in the Czech Republic). Two other actors I place in high regard – Jonathan Pryce and Martin Sheen – are, inexplicably, in this mess too. A word of advice to Rhames, Pryce and Sheen: shoot your agents dead. To appear in a film along side Edward Burns is the worst kind of career suicide. Now, a word on the acting of the local supporting cast (by which I mean those who grew up in the former USSR); that word: atrocious. I’ve not seen such stiff, awkward and unintelligible people in a (non-foreign, non-indie) movie since I watched "Hitman" (2007) in theaters almost three years ago. Another side-note: you know what? I think "Hitman" may be a better film than "Echelon Conspiracy"; again just to give you an idea of how completely terrible this move is. I find it difficult to believe that Greg Marcks directed this film, partly because his debut feature, "11:14" (2003), showed real promise. After watching "Echelon Conspiracy", with its poorly directed actors and misguided, ill-executed action scenes, I am, however, more than disappointed with the filmmaker. We have, in my opinion, rather than a new, deeply creative mind to keep an eye on, another Richard Kelly. That is to say: excellent first film, increasingly dreadful follow-ups. Perhaps, with his next picture (if there is one) Marcks will make something worthwhile; and hopefully it will be much better than the crap I just had to sit through. "Echelon Conspiracy": a film so bad I wouldn’t even accept it as a gift (ironic twist: "The Gift", it seems, was the films original title).
Video
For a direct-to-video title, "Echelon Conspiracy" deserves accolades concerning its video transfer. Wait, what? No, I’m sorry, that’s all wrong. What I meant to say was: "Echelon Conspiracy" has a middling anamorphic 2.40:1 widescreen transfer that looks just like a direct-to-video production. A sad state as, believe it or not (and even if it only lasted a week there) the film was intended for an actual theatrical release. I don’t know if it was a stylistic choice or a budgetary constraint but the Super35 photography is exceedingly grain-heavy – a nightmare for DVD with its meager bandwidth – the result, as you would expect, is a film riddled with compression artifacts and noise. It’s also occasionally murky and soft. The visual aesthetic doesn’t do the film any favors with its occasionally drab, steely palette. And if the film isn’t dull it’s full of blooming, overblown hues (teetering on the verge of color bleeding) – not exactly attractive. Lackluster production values do still more harm: even in standard definition, the CGI looks poor. Not a terrible transfer – I’ve certainly seen worse even from films as new as this – but a half-decent DVD without signs of edge enhancement isn’t all that impressive in today’s home video market.
Audio
If I had to pick one acceptable area of this disc it would easily be the discs lone audio track, encoded as English Dolby Digital 5.1 surround. Not exactly mind blowing, but, as I said, acceptable. It passes, with clear dialog and some decent enough surround use. Bass is a bit overloud and action heavy scenes are perhaps not the pinnacle of home theatre mixing – a bit jumbled to be honest – but it’s also not the train wreck it could have been. Subtitles are offered in English, French and Spanish.
Extras
Zippo – well, aside from a few bonus trailers that is. Although, I’m not sure that this being a barebones release is a bad thing, since the film is such as piece of … anyway, on top of offering no extras of consequence, the trailers are window-boxed within the 4:3 frame. Lame. Bonus trailers are for: - "Eagle Eye" runs for 2 minutes 26 seconds. - "Defiance" runs for 2 minutes 17 seconds. - "Paramount/CBS TV on DVD" promo runs for 1 minute 20 seconds. - "American Gangster: The Complete Second Season" runs 30 seconds.
Overall
Kill it. Kill it with fire. Drown it. Bury it. Never, ever, ever watch this movie; "Echelon Conspiracy" is not one of those films that falls into the so-bad-it’s-good category: it’s just terrible.
|
|||||
|