Shooter (2007)

Amazing Adventure Political Thriller

This is a great film. Mark Wahlberg is always reliable for turning in a quality performance so sometimes he can be taken for granted. Remember how he shocked everyone with his excellent performance in Boogie Nights? Well here he possesses an amazingly strong constant presence that never lets up. He is an action adventure superstar.

The simple basis of the plot is that he is a shooter for the war/government in retirement and is called upon to undertake a special mission. That is all I will say for nothing else about this movie is simple.

The movie is a high octave full force action thriller and the action sequences are amazing lighting up the screen. There is graphic violence but it is very well executed and fits the format of the film. It is not gratuitous. The film is also a thriller with a strong political edge. How all this mixes together so expertly is due to the true craftsmen who have put this film together. And Wahlberg allows the strong esemble cast to shine and does not try to steal the show even though it is totally his.

This movie literally blew me away. I really did love it. It is over 2 hours in length and the time flew by with action and shocks and plot twist too many to mention. Highly recommend. August 28, 2008

If you liked Mark Wahlberg in the Bourne Films, You will like this movie

If you liked Mark Wahlberg in the Bourne movies, you will most likely enjoy this movie. It is action packed and movies quickly except for a few preachy moments at the end. As a person who has enjoyed long range target shooting and am familiar with the Barret 50 Cal capabilities, I know that the shots in this film were all realistic. August 23, 2008

Hollywoodimess Turkeyanus

"The Shooter" is a movie obviously intended for 15 y.o. schoolboys and Michael Moore/Oliver Stone aficionados. It is truly the worst movie that I've seen in some time. It relies entirely on old Hollywood standbys--fatal wounds that the hero recovers from; car chase scenes; heroes that never miss; bad guys who always miss; sinister government plots; sinister FBI characters etc.

It's an Oliver Stone film on crack. There are echoes of "JFK" i.e. the three guys on the grassy knoll are buried in Terlingua. Hey, I've still got the shovel." There are even echoes of the Ruby Ridge massacre. Our 'hero' is living way out in the woods. The FBI shoots his dog. Man, man, man, really original stuff.

The plot is far too complex, far too complex to follow, but, not to worry, the director explains it in the end. The government killed 400 villagers in Ethiopia so that an oil pipeline could go through [get that, folks, evil oil]. Now we don't quite know why they were killed but apparently it's so other villagers will get the message and just get up and move away. Logical. Our hero and his shooter friend, shoot Ethiopian retaliation forces but of this I was never clear. Maybe they were they were shooting the bad guys who did the village murders and our hero, in turn, murders them as a cover-up. Not to worry. Our hero doesn't know who he's shooting, either and, the government, rather than extract or heroes, shoots them up with a helicopter and his friend is killed. Of course, as we are watching all this we have no clue as to what's happening...we have to wade through hours and hours of this turkey dreck hoping that maybe somebody will make sense of it. Truly, they never really do.

Our hero, after his return, is intelligently employed to detect a long range sniper trying to kill the President. It's at an outdoor Presidential review featuring the archbishop of Ethiopia [is there an archbishop of Ethiopia?]. Boom! Goes a shot which we learn later, deliberately misses the President and kills the Ethiopian. Perfect good sense. Suddenly the cops are shooting our hero--again, we have no way of knowing why. Despite the fact that the hero is shot through the axillary artery, which would have killed him in minutes, and through the gut, which would have disabled him in hours, and killed him in a day or two, our super-hero soldiers on to kill thousands and thousands of bad guys [make that agents and U.S. soldiers] with rifles, pistols, machine guns, garrots, karote and miscellaneous bombs.

Wow!!! What a guy! And he does all this while mumbling his lines which adds to the mystery of the whole thing.

Now, a word for the writers, directors and producers, if they ever read these things. Why in H... can't you use just a tad of originality? Why does it always have to be all this Hollywood BS and tripe? Are you imbeciles or just younger than 22? Do you still have problems with acne? Who are you going to vote for in November? Yeah, I know, it's just a joke. The whole stinkin' thing is a joke. Get your stuff together, boys and girls. You have nothing to lose but your American Civil Liberties card.

Ron Braithwaite August 23, 2008

Who Doesn't Love Mark Wahlberg!?

I have never seen a sniper movie before, and was pleasantly surprised by this one. I may not have any experience with snipers or any type of guns or warfare, but I have in fact, watched a lot of movies. You get plenty of action, minimal love story (I don't like a lot of romance in my action movies), up to bar acting, and a solid plot.

The main character, Bob Lee Swagger (Wahlberg) is a former military sniper who gets caught up (more like used) in an assassination. Swagger, initially asked to make sure the President would be safe from an attack, ends up being set up for the assassination "attempt" that takes place. So it begins, intense chases, exciting shootouts, well planned set ups, and on-target sniper shooting. I won't go into the plot any further; especially since you have 200+ people I see who have laid it all out for you already. I will offer my review though, and I think this movie is worth a go, and eight dollars is not a bad price!
August 7, 2008

Mumblin' Marky and friends shoot down 2 hours of your life

It's a little bit Clint Eastwood, a little bit MacGuyver, a little bit Rambo, and a whole lotta BS. It's Bob Lee Swagger, played with gritty resolve by Mark Wahlberg. From the angry scowl to the pained grimace, he's got all the dramatic bases covered. It is impossible to understand about 75% of his dialogue because he speaks in a very rapid mumble, but since we have seen these scenarios in a thousand other movies, we really don't need to hear him clearly, to understand what's going on. Space does not permit me to detail all the ridiculously implausible situations and impossible exploits in this high-octane action flick. Wahlberg is a patriotic super-soldier with almost supernatural abilities, who gets double crossed by his government. When he gets set up as a patsy by a team of shadow-government assassins, salvation comes in the form of his fallen buddy's girlfriend, a doe-eyed young beauty played by Ms. Mara. He has been shot to pieces, but sends her to Walgreens with a list of 12 common household items, which she then uses to sew him back together and nurse him back to health, although she is not a nurse but just a humble third grade teacher (who happens to live in a home that no twenty-something third-grade teacher in the South could ever afford, but be that as it may....)

Swagger is then primed and ready to seek revenge against the villains who betrayed him, including one played by Danny Glover. (We know that Mr. Glover is playing a bad guy because his voice is hoarse and raspy and he never smiles), and an evil senator played by Ned Beatty (we know that Mr. Beatty is a bad senator because he is old and white). This is when the MacGuyver-like devices are constructed with common items hurriedly purchased at the hardware store. It is not clear how the expensive items are paid for, or why the hardware store would have high explosives and high-tech in-the-ear two-way communications devices, but be that as it may.... we then have more helicopters, more heads being blown off, a tape-recorded confession, a secret meeting or two, an arm or two being shot off, etc. Need I elaborate further?

If you are a 14 year old male and thirsty for some blood and explosions, check it out. Otherwise, you might want to pass, because you may find it very hard to suspend your disbelief for a solid two hours. The film critic from the L.A. Times owes me some money, because it was on his recommendation that I let two hours of my life get shot down in flames like an evil black helicopter by Jimmy Lee Swaggart, er uh I mean Bob Lee Swagger. Praise the lord and pass the ammo, America. August 4, 2008

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