The Sentinel

Michael Douglas is a secret service agent framed in a plot to kill the President of the US. Kiefer Sutherland is the agent on his tail.

Its not a bad movie its just been there done that with form over content film making. There is no real tension because the actors are in roles they've played a dozen or so times before (Sutherland in 24 each week)so you can pretty much walk them through whats happening.Thats the problem here, its all been done before, better.

The real question is: Do I really need to pay 10 bucks a head to see whats a essentially a big screen TV movie? I think not. As I said its not bad, its just not worth running out to the theater to see. Wait for cable where this movie really belongs.

It's been 19 years since Gordon Gekko used "Wall Street" to let us know that greed is good. Now, Michael Douglas takes the GG persona and morphs it into a Secret Service agent, Pete Garrison. Guess what? It works! This is a solid political thriller that kept me guessing. The detail work in showing the security precautions taken by the SS on behalf of the President and First Lady was likewise intriguing. All the leads were pretty good but, try as I might, I could not accept Eva Longoria as a Secret Service agent. Whereas Jodie Foster just made you suspend belief and really think she was FBI agent Starling in "Silence of the Lambs", you do not get the same feeling with Longoria. Nevertheless, this is a fun film, escapist entertainment with the Beltway as the backdrop.

Spoiler!!! Stop now if you don't know the ending. I hate Tom Cruise Mission Impossible bastardizations. In the old TV series that used to be one of my all time favorites, Mr. Phelps was the voice of God. He was the ultimate Good Guy. Cruise's updated version of MI (No. 1) turned Mr. Phelps into the Bad Guy. That's like making Tonto the Bad Guy who does in the Lone Ranger. I hate movies -- or novels -- that do that, where it turns out that the DA prosecuting the innocent accused killer turns out to have done the murder himself, or the Vice President turns out to be the mole from the whatever enemy who poisons the President -- or in the case of the Sentinel, the head of the Secret Service turns out to be the Bad Guy about to kill the Prez. I warned you, that's a huge spoiler. But to me, that kind of plot is already spoiled. As the main revelation of the movie, it stinks.

Besides that, even if you don't have any more trust in your leaders than to give credence to "Mr. Phelps" turnabouts, Sentinel has some other gaping holes just too big to let slide. Maybe, just maybe, you could buy that the First Lady is having an affair with her SS detail chief behind the Prez's back. That's not impossible. Presidents have affairs, why not First Ladies? But can you really believe a guy could rise to the top of the Service itself without ever having been fully screened? Really! You think? And what was that mystery terror organization behind the plot, and how did they get onto the SS head's entanglement with the now-defunct KGB? Hmmnh? Another poser: Can anyone explain how that Xavier loser guy got all that insider info about the First Lady's affair with Douglas to begin with -- if you tell me it was the Head of the Service feeding it to him, then why the whole rest of the movie? He would have just removed the Douglas character for cause from the outset, don't cha know? The cast was good and the acting was varsity level. I liked that Michael Douglas gets to act his age, and the plot doesn't let him get away with being a 60 year old superstud who can outrun the young agents under his charge. He is slow, and he gets winded quickly. I liked Keifer. I never watched 24, but now I think I'd like it. And it was good to see Kim Basinger again, after all those years when she dropped out.

If you ignore the plot holes and the revolting spoiler, you could really like the movie for what it shows you about the inner workings of the Secret Service, one of the all-time real success stories of government service. A Beltway insider who should know told me that that part of the film was A+, and I'll take his word for it.

"The Sentinel" is an average-at-best action drama that does not come remotely close to reaching its potential. The entire movie feels rushed, with random details about each character's past thrown at you in a poorly-written screenplay. The revelation of the true bad guy in conspiracy films normally elicits at least some form of surprise or intrigue; instead, in "The Sentinel" the character is far too obvious and the scene reveals a tangential and unexplained back story that should instead be much more central to the plot.

The rush to cram details in every fleeting moment ruins this movie. For example, without spoiling the film, the culminating chase of the movie is ruined by a ridiculous proclamation of certain password to get by people; the ridiculousness of the situation takes away from what should be a tense finish.

This review is not meant to be overly disparaging; the film received 5/10 because it is a moderately entertaining summer movie and I did not regret going to see it. However, the skeleton plot seemed to be trying too hard and the characters were not well-utilized. Eva Longoria is very attractive though.

I was enthusiastic about this film being the '24' fan that I am and I knew it was going to be a bad movie but had to see it for myself.

The story line is crud, Michael Douglas has done much better and there have been hundreds of films such as this in the past before.

The only remotely interesting part of this film was the parts at the beginning when they go into detail as to how the President is protected.

Kiefer Sutherland was probably paid a barrel load for this movie and it will certainly be one he wont be remembered for.

Script - Poor Beginning - Average Ending - Poor