Atlas Shrugged: Part III

I am a big fan of the book, and I liked the first movie. That said, this was awful.

The story is rushed, character development is thin to none, and some of the best scenes from the book are missing. Whether or not you agree with Ayn Rand, she understood the beast (in her opinion) very well, and represented the conflict through engaging dialogue in fiction. There is none of that here.

Instead, there is a string of passionate speeches given by the central star but he comes across somewhere between a crazy man on the New York subway, and a poorly edited Anonymous speaker on YouTube. He does not come across as a veritable world leader. There are cameos from various B-list news figureheads, making this appear more a reunion of The Celebrity Apprentice than beautiful fictional story with a timely message.

Like others, I saw it to complete the trilogy, and out of respect for an integrity-based way of doing business that is legitimately threatened today. This movie does not help the cause.

They may have taken a few liberties with the original story and plot. Dagny is supposed to be strong submissive and intellectual. In part three we have Dagny toting a gun. Why not just give her an ax?

John Gault is practical and elusive. Yet in the movie John (Kristoffer Polaha) can be easily found and it seems that he is into shock therapy. They make it look like he is into S & M.

Francisco d'Anconia is supposed to be Dagny's childhood buddy; now played (Joaquim de Almeida) at 50 looks more like Dagny's uncle; can you see her on his knee?

If you think the actors were a strange fit wait until you watch the story.

The only redeeming thing is it is better than not having a film at all.

When i thought that Part II was worse than Part I, Part III went one step further. With another change in the cast, it's been difficult again to follow what's been going on.

With the ideas of Ayn Rand diluted in sub-par writing and below average acting, Atlas Shrugged: Who Is John Galt? became a perfect background for an afternoon nap. No pun intended.

Once again, i'm not sure why the producers insisted on making three movies instead of opting for a TV show. Nowadays this seems to be a gateway to a broader audience. Besides, the book Atlas Shrugged had enough contents and ideas for eight to ten one-hour episodes.

"Now you know everything, now you understand why." Dagny Taggart (Regan) has crashed her plane on the other side of the mysterious glow and when she comes to she sees the mysterious John Galt (Polaha). She also sees other people she knew that have disappeared and is told of what is happening. When she makes the choice to return to the "real world" she tries one last time to change the direction of industry and the country. This is a movie series that seemed to get steadily worse. The first one was good and got me sucked in but the second one seemed to drag a lot and the reason I watched this was really just to complete the story. While these movies aren't terrible the fact that they couldn't keep the same cast throughout made it confusing trying to remember who was who and what happened in the earlier movies. I really think had they done this as a mini-series it would have helped. They all have the feel of a made-for-TV movie anyway. Overall, a movie series that started off interesting but really stumbled at the end. Worth a watch just to complete the saga. I give this a C.

It's the curiosity more than anything. I've already seen the first two "Atlas Shrugged" movies; can't really leave the trilogy unfinished, right? This is what drove me to finish an unsatisfactory series of movies. And the final entry finishes things off in the worst possible fashion.

I'm not even concerned with Ayn Rand's philosophy, only with Part III's complete mishandling of it. This is a cartoon with robotic performances, non-existent production values and haphazard direction. The dialogue's stilted, none of these TV actors have any breathing room, and the story rolls out in a hurried low-standards manner. It's so cheap and so cut-rate that any message (even one delivered with a smug sledgehammer) is smothered in the execution. At a certain point, it just becomes unintentionally funny. Just not funny enough to be entertaining.

Is this at all like the book? I have no idea, but once was more than enough with this movie. What a sad end.