movies: deja vu

So obviously, after my last movie review maxing out with 10 out of 10, it doesn't leave anywhere to go but down...

And it doesn't help when there isn't really anything that we definitely wanted to see, and the only thing that was out was Deja Vu...

It also doesn't help that I'm really not a big Denzel Washington fan at the best of times... he's okay, but he's never really been in things I've wanted to see (in fact, this movie makes three Denzel movies I've now seen).

But we've gone to stuff we knew less about and had it turn out great... of course, the flip side of that is Phantoms...

And the first half hour or so of this movie was not filling me with confidence... it just seemed to drag a little... I knew there was some vaguely scifi stuff coming, and it just seemed to be a loooooong time coming. Then when it did arrive it seemed to be really badly written... but no, that just turned out to be a plot point, so that was okay.

I will say that the longer it went on, the better it got... so, in the end section with the shootings and the explosions and the stunts and this, that and the other, I was quite enjoying it.

It's a little like The Lake House in some ways I guess... that whole temporal mechanics thing... and they do actually handle it very well... and by the looks of it, it would actually hold up to repeat viewings when you would realise just how many things at the beginning make more sense at the end of the movie.

I also realised that I have a soft spot for Val Kilmer... maybe it's from his role in Willow, I don't know... but I even like him when he's slightly puffy like he was in the movie, or overacting badly like he did in Alexander...

One thing I did find interesting is that the movie is set in Post Katrina New Orleans... and with the possible exception of one scene, there isn't really a big deal made about the whole thing... it technically could be set anywhere, and it was originally supposed to be Long Island before it got changed, which would have worked just as well I think.

Lifted from imdb.com:

The movie went through pre-production in New Orleans. Just weeks before production was to begin, Hurricane Katrina devastated the city. With the location in ruins, the movie made the decision to find a new location to shoot. Weeks after the decision, cancelling the movie altogether was in talks. Finally, three months after the hurricane, the film returned to New Orleans, Louisiana and began pre-production once again.

So there you have it, originally not New Orleans... then it was New Orleans, then it wasn't... and finally it was.

All trivia aside thought, overall it wasn't bad... a little slow to start with, but not as bad as I'd feared it might be.

yani's rating: 2 exploding ferries out of 5