"You can't say much for a movie whose best part was the trailer for Minority Report..."
The year is 2005 and the violent sport of Rollerball is all the rage in the Middle East. The owner of the popular Red Horsemen team, Alexi Petrovich, is looking to get a worldwide TV deal for Rollerball. And he'll do anything to get it, including setting up players (even his own) for stunts ranging from near-fatal to fatal, all in an attempt to boost ratings and make Rollerball a hotter commodity. But three people stand in the way of his greedy dream, the Horsemen's star players: Jonathon Cross, Aurora, and Marcus Ridley.
To be perfectly honest I have never seen the original Rollerball in its entirety, only in bits-n-pieces. I even have a copy of it lying around somewhere in my mosh pit, but I just don't want to put forth the time or the effort to find it for some reason. I think it has to do with the fact that I've got better things to do than watch the original version of a movie that, for me, is already a guilty pleasure because of its stinkiness. The '02 version is bad. REAL bad. Why is it a guilty pleasure, then? It's a guilty pleasure because I just can't bring myself to totally and utterly hate this flick. Why?
It could be that once you get past the confusing story, you can enjoy some of the action of the film. The game sequences are generally exciting and rather brutal, especially the final one. The visuals are decent, but clichéd: if you've seen any other "future imperfect" flick--especially Schwarzenegger's The Running Man--then you can get a pretty good idea of what to expect here. Or maybe it's the fact that I'm a sports-entertainment kinda guy and get into the circus atmosphere of pro wrestling, which is accurately paralleled here. Heck, pro wrestling personalities Paul Heyman and Shane McMahon even have parts as a play-by-play announcer and as an owner, which were their exact roles in pro wrestling for much of 2001. Or, perhaps, it's the soundtrack, which is very good and consists of bands and performers such as Rob Zombie, Slipknot, and Beautiful Creatures.
Or it might just be Chris Klein's acting ability--nope, thats definitely not it...
This flick is extremely troubled. It doesn't seem to have any direction whatsoever. For example, it jumps right in and shows Jonathon participating in a highly dangerous street-luge contest. When he seems in danger, out of nowhere pops his best friend Marcus (who it just happens he hasn't seen in months and months) to save the day. Then, after a rather perplexing convo that culminates in Marcus inviting Jonathon to come to the Middle East and play Rollerball, the movie jumps ahead 4 months and Jonathon's the biggest star in the league. The first hour or so of the flick continues in this befuddled manner. The depiction of the violence of Rollerball is the only thing that adds any real substance to the story or plot besides the hush-hush romance of Aurora and Jonathon, which isn't helped by the zero degrees of heat that Romijn and Klein have onscreen. Only when the climax (although I would hardly call it that) starts to approach does the movie get anywhere near interesting. It's almost impossible to fathom that the director responsible for the first and third Die Hard movies, as well as The Hunt for Red October and Predator, is accountable for these foul-ups.
Also, the visuals aren't entirely good, especially in the camerawork. The Jonathon-Marcus escape scene is shot entirely with a night-vision camera, which leaves the screen with a green tint the whole time. While it is a rather innovative concept to make use of a night-vision cam in a non-war film, it's rather ill placed here. The scene is shot poorly, and that is something that you do not want to happen while using a night-vision cam because things can become easily distorted, which is what happens. It leaves you with a headache, not unlike the reek that emits from this flick.
Oh, and let's not forget about casting: Chris Klein acts about as well as a malignant tumor. LL Cool J is a crapper-rapper, which definitely doesn't translate into being a "good" or even "mediocre" actor (just look at Ice T's or Tupac's flicks, if you dare). Romijn is only useful for the occasional semi-nude boob shot, which seems to be her only purpose here. And Jean Reno is one of the lamest villains I've ever seen; he doesn't seem at any point to be intimidating and you can't even understand half of the things he says because of his thick accent. The only bright spot in the casting is Paul Heyman, who does a tremendous job as the Rollerball play-by-play guy, which was helped by Heyman's experience as a pro wrestling commentator.
My overall synopsis is simple: you can do a lot more with your time and money than spending it on Rollerball '02. You can buy a Chia Pet, a 6-pack of Hanes underwear, or a thousand pieces of Super Bubble for the price of admission or rental to this tripe. If you have any desire to see this movie at all, save it until it hits the value shelf at your local video store. Which should only take, say, a few weeks after it's released. After all, you can't say much more for a movie whose best part was the trailer for Minority Report...
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