vantage point

its been a while since ive been to the theater, so i figured it was time to fix that. i found a cool little dollar theater around and they were showing 'vantage point', one that i had wanted to see but missed in the first run theaters.

the film is about an assassination attempt on the president of the united states while he is in spain. the gimmick of the movie is that we get to see the same event from many different perspectives. we follow the news crew as it is covering it, a secret service agent covering the president, a couple bystanders who are there for the speech, and the president himself. the gimmick works, for the most part, except that it gets annoying quickly. we see the event from one perspective, and then, just as that persons story get interesting, we rewind and see it all again from another perspective. that one goes until it gets interesting, and then we rewind again. this happens a total of six times! enough, we get it- lets see how it plays out already! once they leave behind the gimmick the movie really picks up. we get to see how everyone is connected with a part of the story and each characters story pays off in the end. there are some great chase sequences, and it does a good job of keeping the tension up (once it stops rewinding, anyway). dennis quaid does a great job as the secret service guy, but some of the other actors dont quite hit their marks. there are many many times where it takes a huge amount of suspension of disbelief. guys keep getting thrown to the ground or hit by cars and they just get right back up as if nothing happened, and the coincidences are far beyond the realm of reality. but if your able to get past those leaps of logic, then youll enjoy the ride. its instantly forgettable, but it is a bit of fun.