The Spy Code

Yeah, nope!

One of the dullest "action thrillers" I've seen in recent memory. One that is easy to follow.. but maybe too easy! With a strange and lethargic pacing that makes the first 20 minutes feel like an hour! A dull and lackluster execution, and a storyline that hardly goes anywhere. It's so underwritten it almost feels like a mystery!! As that expected layer of depth or a message is strangely missing. This is a Saban film through and through! With their level of 'effort' being all too present. It's as if the film was made on autopilot, coasting on bland tropes to fill in the space. If the sluggish pace doesn't lull you to sleep, the slow, melodic music just might. The action scenes could be skipped completely, as they don't help move the story forward.. much less keep your attention on the screen. Even worse, you could watch this on mute, and take away as much as I did trying to pay attention.

Don't even think about it.. it's not worth your time.

A plotline that's been done many times before and with far greater success. Classified zigzags from ridiculous to wooden without warning. The abject quality of the dialogue is only matched by its delivery, and in the movies dullest and cringiest moments, you can almost see Aaron Eckhart thinking that he hopes the cheque clears. Nothing about this movie is believable, from the backstory to relationships between the main characters. Poor casting, poor dialogue and poor audience. I would say this movie is bottom of the barrel, but that would imply that it's contained in some way. Looking at previous work from the director and the main actors I am surprised that any of them even signed up for this. If you literally have nothing else to do, and that includes going to the dentist or housework, then watch this movie.

The worst screen writing and acting I've seen in at least the past 20 years. Not worth the time to press the play button. Just terrible terrible, terrible, terrible! And it's ridiculous that it requires me to write a minimum of 600 words for this review to even be accepted - but if you must... I love Actor Eckart but even he must have been embarrassed by day 3 of production on the horrible writing and lack of quality plot! The fighting was totally unrealistic, but the plot was even worse - disconnected, confusing and illogical. The movie seemed to be in slow motion and overdramatizing every single screen.

I like Tim Roth. I like Aaron Eckhard. What drove them to take part in such a disaster?

The combat scenes are so extremely dumb that Shoot Em Up looks like a documentary compared to this. They managed to mess up even the slightest detail. Mercenaries without body armor, not hitting a barn door from close up, even when they surprise the protagonist. Sure. Oh, and always attack one by one, so the hero wins!

Nothing makes any sense. Fittingly, the CGI is awful.

And, yeah, the rest of the "story" fits right in. The premise is so idiotic that even a little more effort on the writing couldn't have saved it. My guess is they knew, so they didn't bother anyway.

Aaron Eckhart is generally a pretty great actor, and Tim Roth used to have some amazing roles in films, but Classified has really let them both down. The script and dialog sound like it was written by a 14 year old film student, and the acting from every other cast member other than the aforementioned actors is appalling. Abigail Breslin and Brandon Lessard let this film down no end. The acting from Brandon Lessard is especially poor, and the story line that follows his character is non existent.

The only redeeming feature is the cinematography is fairly good, and its great they shot so much of it on location in Malta.