Pompeii

Flat like a week-open can of Bud. This time it isn’t Anderson’s fault alone. A screenwriter’s mishmash of Gladiator, Spartacus and Dante’s Peak suffers from inane dialogs and mostly predictable plot. Jon Snow is a bit stiff, but if he doesn’t attempt any romance, he’s bearable. Kiefer gets almost perverted enjoyment from playing the villain from the Reich, but that doesn’t make the end result much better. The only really good thing is Shorter’s music, the volcano action in the finale, and I was surprise that it was all over. Do you like sport? (05/31/2014)

The main and practically only unusual thing about Pompeii is the effort combine disaster-flick spectacle with antiquity action. The two types of film are melded together through the clever use of melodramatic conventions, as the essence of the genre calls for the extinction of both the gladiator and the individual facing the wrath of nature. Roughly half of the film consists in setting up the narrative background required for the individualistic hero’s effective engagement with external events and it is exceedingly obvious that Anderson does not enjoy directing actors (if anyone is interested how Kit Harington performs, he performs exactly as he does in Game of Thrones). Thanks to this basic arrangement of relationships and motifs, on the other hand, Anderson is able to engage in PG-13 fight scenes and spectacular Emmerich-esque destruction until the end. It’s a satisfactory spectacle, but it’s nothing special even in 3D, which only really works when the action takes place on multiple levels (roughly one or two scenes). The action scenes are muddled due to the quick editing and off-centre compositions (the characters nonsensically fight at the edge of screen multiple times). In addition to that, they are much more grounded and with less video-game stylisation that you would expect from the director of Mortal Kombat, multiple instalments of the Resident Evil franchise and Death Race. The games resemble “bird's-eye-view” shots of the city (as from an RTS), whose main purpose is to prepare us for the aforementioned combining of genres, i.e. for the biblical scale of the impending devastation. The religious subtext or, more precisely, the use of the principle of divine justice is the only instance of reviving the popular leftist story of a man of the people who stands up to a powerful empire personified by a greedy senator (Kiefer Sutherland delivers the only – and probably unintentionally – funny line in the entire film). Pompeii isn’t as blatantly stupid as Need for Speed; I’d even venture to say that it contains a small amount of historical truth, but as with Need for Speed, you will likely walk out of the cinema unsatisfied if you don’t appreciate how exemplarily it fills out the classic Hollywood narrative template and genre formulas. 65% (03/19/2014)

When the love or motivation of the main characters is formed by a single bit of dialogue or a transparent situation, not even excellent casting can help. Kit Harington, Kiefer Sutherland, and Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje can work hard to bring some freshness to their stereotypical characters, but it only lasts until the script inserts another one-word confession into their mouths. After the highly entertaining The Three Musketeers, I expected Paul W.S. Anderson's next journey into history to be a perfect fit, but despite the fights, horses, destruction, or lava of Pompeii, it puts you to sleep more than it entertains you. (06/17/2014)

Although Paul W.S. Anderson has made a number of downright stupid films so far, most of them have at least entertained me in some way. Not Pompeii, though. The wait for the special effects frothing was extremely long, and when I got it, I felt that it should end again. I wasn't impressed with the central duo either, but Kiefer Sutherland was clearly having a good time. At least someone was, right? (01/17/2015)

A prequel to Gladiator with embarrassing sets, decent fights, especially considering that it’s PG-13, but there are too many references and similarities that are reproduced too clumsily to be nodded in agreement. The acting is basically nothing and the script is a big pile of pathos and a confusion of all the clichés. All that remains is solid visuals and that's it. (09/07/2014)