Extremely dangerous! - Russian style in Hollywood

Title : Particularly dangerous

Genre : Action
Director : Timur Bekmambetov
Cast : Thomas Kretschmann, Common, Angelina Jolie, James McAvoy, Morgan Freeman, Terence Stamp, Kristen Hager, Mark Warren, David O'Hara
Country : USA
Year : 2008

On the world screens is the long-awaited mystical action "Particularly dangerous!" Directed by Timur Bekmambetov, already known in Russia for such films as "Night Watch", "Day Watch" and "The Irony of Fate. Continuation ». For the first time in the history of Hollywood, such a large and expensive film (the budget of the film is 150 million dollars) was entrusted to the Russian director: according to the producers, they were attracted by Bekmambetov's "unique visual language," his "ability to create a completely new world from comic material."
The main role in the film went to the young Scottish actor James McEvoy, known for his roles in such films as "The Atonement", "The Chronicles of Narnia" and "Jane Austen" - an unusual choice, but, strangely enough, quite convincing. "It was important for us to find an actor understandable to the public," explains one of the producers of the picture Mark Plat. McEvoy managed to convey the evolution of his hero - a simple bank clerk, a loser and a spittle, who, however, should become a superhero - a new generation killer, destroying the villains at the behest of Destiny.

The young actor is supported by such stars as Angelina Jolie and Morgan Freeman; a small, but important role of the chief physician in the Brotherhood went to Konstantin Khabensky, who always managed to fit organically into what is happening on the screen. The soundtrack to the painting was written by Denny Elfman, the author of music for such movie hits as Spider-Man, Simpsons in Cinema, Hulk, Sleepy Hollow, Psycho and many other world-famous films.

We must admit that the closeness of the words "Russian" and "blockbuster" is alarming and even somehow unpleasantly surprising. What is a "Russian blockbuster" Russian viewer could not understand yet, and the opportunity to understand plainly somehow did not seem to be. Of those paintings, whose names are not too embarrassing to say aloud, only the "Code of Apocalypse" is recalled, but here there is a feeling of some awkwardness. However, relax: everything is not so scary. "Especially dangerous", although filmed by a Russian director, contains a full set of attributes of a true Hollywood cinema: the film is full of zubodrobitelnymi special effects, exciting dynamics and all the things that modern Russian cinema is sometimes so lacking (primarily the most important, without which Hollywood cinema has already not perceived - a solid budget).

Moreover, the creators tried to bring innovative notes to the picture, using supposedly unprecedented visual effects: heroes rammed faces with glass, admired with amazing weapons, bullets punched their foreheads and returned back to the trunk themselves. "For me, emotion is important, not an effect," explains Timur Bekmambetov, "I had a hundred ideas at once, and all different, all struggled with each other. I create a new style, such as no one has ever seen. " True, what this new style consists of, we could not find out: by and large, there is no novelty and courage in everything that is happening on the screen, - rather, there is not quite justified pretentiousness. If the attempt to move away from the canonical set of special effects was done, then it did not go beyond parasitizing techniques and finds that were full of mischief.

The musical background of the film, written by maestro Denny Elfman, is sometimes inexpressibly good, and at times starts to annoy. The philosophy of the picture suffers a loud, irreparable, crushing fiasco. Knights, brotherhoods, secret communities and other communities that rule or desire to rule the world have long been surprising. The list of tapes that developed this topic is quite large: from Stanley Kubrick with "Widely closed eyes", to Ron Howard with the "Da Vinci Code". In the film "Particularly dangerous" the right to decide who to live and who does not, tries to take on the Brotherhood of Weavers - the ancient guild of ministers of Destiny: at the headquarters of the Brotherhood there is a huge loom with which the ministers decipher the binary code. When someone's number drops out, a member of the Brotherhood must kill this person, thereby, as it were, assuming the position of "cleaner".

The main character Wesley, whom the Brotherhood taught all the wits of the killer, will not like this injustice: he will fight, and, of course, he will win. Alas, the storyline of the film does not offer us anything new, on the contrary: everything that happens on the screen, the viewers saw so many times that they could have memorized every turn for a long time. There is no innovation here, and if not for the dynamism and pressure with which the picture was taken, we with a clear conscience would advise you to escape from the middle of the session.
A little correction of the state of things fussy humor. Angelina Jolie at the wheel of the "penny" looks, of course, funny and even eccentric, like a complete jauntiness joke. "I like that this film does not seem to take itself seriously. He does not pretend to be cool, "- comments the actress. "Heroes turn to laughter, being surrounded by cruelty - and viewers take it for granted," Bekmambetov said. With this it's hard to argue: treating such films seriously would be a huge stupidity.

There is in the picture and a barely noticeable scurf of "Russianness": Russian film school, Russian cinema. It is rather difficult to explain what it is manifested in. Something imperceptibly Russian is in the actor's game, and in building the frame, but it's hidden between the lines. This plaque can be felt, but it can and is not; in the latter case, to find in "Especially dangerous" at least some difference from other similar action games, you are unlikely to succeed.

The Hollywood filmmaking machine annually produces hundreds of such uncomplicated militants, with an unpretentious plot, good computer graphics, chases and shootings. Do not expect to see in the "Particularly dangerous" something more: such pictures look, rather to disable the head, rather than activate mental processes. If the director of this tape was not our compatriot, it would be unlikely that we would find anything remarkable in it. Although the beautiful picture, nice protagonist and Angelina Jolie look always nice.