Common Sense Observations

Movie review of Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever

DAMIEN’S RATING of Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever: 6 – This movie was okay. I wouldn’t drive to the DVD rental place to get it, though. If you’re in the market for something new and ‘risky,’ this might be your movie for the weekend.

See the complete movie rating system here.

Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever reviewed in 25 words or less: Great cast. Lots of okay action. Shallow plot. Poor dialog. No great character(s).

FULL REVIEW of Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever

Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever stars Antonio Banderas, Lucy Liu, Gregg Henry, Ray Park and Talisa Soto. Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever was directed by Wych Kaosayananda.

I must confess that I had difficulty deciding whether to rate Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever as a 5 or a 6. I finally decided on a 6 because this is an action movie, and it does have lots of action. The action scenes are not really very creative, but they’re well shot and varied.

There really haven’t been many creative action scenes shot since the 90′s. In fact, barring the inclusion of science fiction characters and devices, it’s getting almost impossible for action writers, directors and choreographers to present movie goers with anything new and exciting. This only makes sense. The more that is done, the less there is to be done. It’s the same as plots. There aren’t many plots that have not been done – many, many times in one way or another.

In Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever, two ex-uberagents have been wronged – though only one of them knows it at the start of the movie – and they are pitted against one another by the evil man in power. Antonio Banderas and Lucy Liu play the agents, respectively, and the evil man in charge is the easy-to-hate Gregg Henry. The two ex-agents spend the beginning of the movie fighting each other, but towards the end they join forces to fight their common enemy.

One thing that is noticeably missing from Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever, is a character we can love or relate to or cheer for. I am a fan of both Banderas and Liu, so I would have been pretty easy to sell, and I was not. So those less inclined to like those actors don’t have a prayer of finding a hero in Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever. I primarily blame poorly written dialog for this, but costumes and direction also played their role.

One other serious problem with Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever is that Banderas doesn’t really fit any molds as an action hero type – at least not in this movie. I am not really sure why he was cast against successful action femme Lucy Liu. Banderas is a Latin heartthrob type, but in this movie he’s stripped of all the things that make the ladies swoon. He’s a mess. Liu, on the other hand, is a high fashion action babe with stylish outfits and every-hair-in-place scenes. More than once during the movie, Carrie Moss in Matrix comes to mind.

I will likely never watch Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever again. You may or may not like it. If you’re an action genre buff, and you run out of reasonable alternatives, this one might just be your salvation for a Friday night.