rcp02

Hollywood has been remaking a lot of movies lately with usually terrible results, and this is no exception. The scriptwriter has taken the original script, and rewrote it while apparently stoned or on coke. The original movie has an extremely clear storyline with no idiotic story twists, no decidedly crazy and astronomically improbable behavior like this one has in spades, and is excellent from first moment to last.

This piece of sputum on the other hand will let you feel like you want to bash the characters heads in half of the time for being so stupid and outrageously insane. The most pathetic part of this movie is the fact that despite having state of the art special effects it can't hold a candle to the original, which had hardly any effects whatsoever, never mind special ones.

True, it is not completely abysmal like , say , the day after tomorrow, and has at times decent acting. But good actors like John Cleese for instance are completely wasted in this movie, and even Reeves and Connely perform like wooden dolls at times. I won't spoil the end to you; I don't need to, it is bad enough that it will spoil itself.

Script: Zero .. Done by a chimp and two stray dogs taken from the streets. Edmund North is rolling in his grave.

Acting: far below average most of the time, sometimes OK

Music: Music? What music?

Effects: Made irrelevant by sheer lack of everything else...

Directing: I would be ashamed to be affiliated with this movie, even as a janitor. In fact, I would be ashamed been seen holding the DVD at a rental.

This movie is much less about the solving of a crime than it is about the difficulty of one people living apart by an absurd accident of history. It is not a whodunit, it is a story of human friendship above rules and almost fanatical enmity. Al characters portrayed are equally human, even up to the completely one-sided South Korean general who thinks the only good commie is a dead one. This movie is a metaphor for both Korea's today, seeking to come closer to each but prepared to slit each others throat in a split second just the same. At the same time the practical difficulties in making friends across such a divide show that not only can the difficulties of two countries be accurately conveyed into the behavior of just four people, it also shows how vice-versa the actions of both Korea's, which inevitably lead to great drama, is at the same time a metaphor for the small tragedy that unfolds in the joint security area. Highly recommended, if only for the last shot of the film which is almost literally a snapshot of the entire bond of friendship portrayed in the film, even beyond borders.