NetForce

I rented this because of Tom Clancy's name alone. What a mistake. All adaptations of his excellent books (with the possible except of "Red October") have ruined plots, hopeless scripts and near-intolerable acting from otherwise fine performers. This, sadly, was no different. Nothing in the look and feel of the movie even suggests Hollywood involvement -- it looks, and indeed IS, so badly done it seems to be a television series pilot (complete with "cut to commercial fade-outs") that did not make it. The video release is an attempt to regain some lost revenue. Movie plots still don't handle technology, and especially the Internet, realistically unless the story is full-bore sci-fi. Don't waste your time or money on this.

For a film based upon such a refined subject as computers and the intricacies of the internet, I felt sure that there'd have to be some sort of off-the-cuff humour injected somewhere during proceedings to offset the technical detail. Surely they couldn't expect everybody to get excited about firewalls, web browsers and computer crime without something else to keep it company. Well, as it turns out, that's exactly what they expected and the film turns out to be drier than dust.

Some of the technical detail was stretched to the very limit of credibility - it seems they severely overshot what the internet would be like in 2005 - yet they still imagined we'd be using floppy disks? More research, and effort, was called for in places that's for sure.

Plus, it was an hour too long. Nearly 160 minutes is far too excessive for a film of its kind and an hour could easily have been taken off without too many problems. The acting was hokey - but not as bad as some TV movies - the technology very dodgy in parts and the romance subplot extremely wobbly, but anybody with even half an interest in computers and the internet may as well give it a go.

Made for tv movies can never escape the feeling they we're made for television. The taste, the sight and the scent. It's always there. Tom Clancy's Netforce itself was originally a two part television movie (how little did I know). In fact, it's all still somewhat a wash. Let me break it down for you.

Flash forward to 2005. The internet has become so powerful and potentially dangerous that the US government sets up a division within the FBI entitled "Netforce" to preside over it from the evil people of the world who look to exploit it for their corrupt plans. Personally I seriously disbelieve the internet holds the future of the world in it's grasp, but that doesn't matter because the people at Netforce couldn't protect it if they had to anyway.

Upon meeting the major characters we realize they're roles we've all seen before. Like the male main character who's strong and dresses well. The rest of the cast fit typical molds. I especially liked how a certain character's ex-wife is a news reporter who at one point becomes a key piece in the story. Everyone is so linked together. Realistic? No. Then again none of the characters have any real depth. They're just names and faces. There's also too many needless minor characters who provide nothing but padding and viewer confusion. It gets hard remembering twenty characters throughout a two plus hour movie. I want to give credit for trying to develop them, but it fails because we know they're insignificant.

Frankly I expected more from such an ensemble cast too. Scott Bakula gets to look smart in suit, but this could have benefited from someone with more clout than Bakula. He's sufficient, but that's about it. Meanwhile Kris Kristofferson gets the cliché elder role and good 'ol Brian Dennehy has been given the plum task of the President's Chief Of Staff. That means him popping up spewing 'How his ass is on the line' or 'the President's p***ed at him'. Yes good actors can't save bad scripts. That's a fact. Which bothers me even further because this product has Tom Clancy's name written all over it. Yet it isn't anywhere near the quality of his past outings. It's a real disservice. Some of the blame has to fall straight into the writer's lap too. I say this because I find it hard to see this as an adaptation project that started well. It was bad from the get-go. The story stinks. It's amateur hour.

Especially considering how much they squeeze into their time frame. Would more have helped? I'm hesitant to say. Even with over two hours they still came back with this slop. Frankly 160 minutes is a long time and there isn't enough depth to sustain a person's interest or the holding of disbelief for such a period.

It can't even be taken seriously. Like Judge Reinhold playing the 'evil multi-billion dollar software tycoon' looking to control the world or how corny it is to have FBI agents point loaded weapons in the faces of innocent cabdrivers. It's things like these that help make Netforce such a bore and honestly for a film dealing so heavily with computers and the internet, they sure went skimpy on the technical aspects too. I guess they didn't want to lose their biggest viewing demographic ... computer inept coach potatoes and patriotic Tom Clancy fans.

For what it's trying to be, NetForce offers very little (if any) paranoia, suspense or "edge of your seat excitement" as so called critics would say. Netforce draws nothing but boredom and that's not exactly new territory. Last thing too. A golden rule of movies. If they don't find a body 95% of the time that's a clear signal the person ain't dead. That's the facts.

At least the first 30 minutes, which is all I managed before I had to race up to the video rental and get another movie. As Robert Cooper commented: It's not often that I watch a movie, and feel it necessary to jump straight onto IMDb and write about it, but for an entirely different reason. The first half hour of this movie is so full of clichés, bad acting and cheap effects, I couldn't watch another minute.

Having enjoyed several good movies based on Clancy's novels (Patriot Games, Red October...) I was genuinely disappointed by this botch. I actually get the feeling that these people are acting (not the actors, the characters!).

It's difficult to say anything about the storyline, having seen but a small part of the movie, but I did get the impression I usually get when watching movies about hacking, Internet etc, that these people don't know much about what the Internet is, and how it works. Of course, that MAY have changed later in the movie...

If you're gonna watch this movie, keep your expectations low. My advice: pick another!

Scott Bakula (Quantum Leap's Sam Beckett) and Kris Kristofersson (Blade, Pat Garett and Billy the Kid) star in this below average TV movie. It seems quite a lot of money (for a TV movie) has been thrown at this but the pace at times is down to a crawl and Bakula's character seems to have become head of Netforce with a total lack of any computer knowledge. It's dated fairly badly but all movies about computers do that look at Wargames or Tron! But it's main problems are down to a flabby script, pedestrian direction and lack of tension as for the ending i'm not even going to go there! Let's just say it ain't great, I gave this film a 4/10 as it's not a total lost cause but i cant recommend spending 2+hours watching this when there are better films out there. If you want a hacker movie War Games (Mathew Broderick) or Sneakers (Robert Redford, River Phoenix) are better movies in the same sort of area or for a more MTV friendly teen hacker movie then go for Hackers (Angelina Jolie & Tommy Lee Miller).

4/10 - If there's nothing better on a rainy Sunday it might pass the time but thats about all, we can only hope the Quantum Leap movie gets off the ground to save Scott Bakula!