From the previews Snake Eyes looks awesome. It seems fast paced, complex, and just plain cool. I went to the theatre pumped, "finally something unique in this (very) crappy year for movies". I should've known better....
Nick Santoro (Nicolas Cage) is a laid-back, loud mouth cop who comes across an old friend, Kevin Dunne (Gary Sinise) during a heavyweight fight. Kevin is there to guard the secretary of defense. After the fight starts, a suspicious woman drags Kevin from the secretary of defense and a few moments later an unknown assassin guns down the secretary. Nick begins investigating the security tape taken and starts putting one and one together when he realizes that this assassination attempt may be a conspiracy far more complex that it seemed.
When I was watching Snake Eyes I was wowed by the first half hour or so. DePalma introduces the characters in a long, continuous tracking shot which is pretty interesting. Then after the assassination the story picks up even more. People are not as they seem, the minutes before the fight are described again, but through other character's points of view, the tape reveals that the fight was fixed, adding yet another element to the story! I'm on the edge of my seat, interested as hell in the film... then kaput! We take a bad left turn into "typical cliched action movie land" and the film never recovers from that. As quickly the story pumps you up, it just as quickly lets you down, and on top of that we have a terrible tacked on ending that just tops off the letdown.
Nick Santoro (Nicolas Cage) is a laid-back, loud mouth cop who comes across an old friend, Kevin Dunne (Gary Sinise) during a heavyweight fight. Kevin is there to guard the secretary of defense. After the fight starts, a suspicious woman drags Kevin from the secretary of defense and a few moments later an unknown assassin guns down the secretary. Nick begins investigating the security tape taken and starts putting one and one together when he realizes that this assassination attempt may be a conspiracy far more complex that it seemed.
When I was watching Snake Eyes I was wowed by the first half hour or so. DePalma introduces the characters in a long, continuous tracking shot which is pretty interesting. Then after the assassination the story picks up even more. People are not as they seem, the minutes before the fight are described again, but through other character's points of view, the tape reveals that the fight was fixed, adding yet another element to the story! I'm on the edge of my seat, interested as hell in the film... then kaput! We take a bad left turn into "typical cliched action movie land" and the film never recovers from that. As quickly the story pumps you up, it just as quickly lets you down, and on top of that we have a terrible tacked on ending that just tops off the letdown.