Ultraviolet reviews and opinions.

[ntm7885]

There have been a few opinions and a couple of reviews of Ultraviolet sprouting up on imdb and Their all mixed reviews some people love it some people say the action is all thtas good. I dont readsome of them because I dont want the movie spoiled.

[Psyclops]

I was contacted by director Kurt Wimmer a few days after my review was posted at Ain't-It-Cool-News. He called me up while he was editing the film at the Sony Pictures lot and we ended up talking about the movie for almost an hour. He was very open to my suggestions and took the harshest criticism like a professional, admitting that certain things that may have looked good on paper did not translate well to the big screen. As a result of that review, the opening sequence has been significantly shortened while many of the melodramatic flashbacks will likely be toned down in the final cut.

Many of the problems that I had with the secondary characters and the lousy acting were explained as being the results of a low budget and the constraints of filming in mainland China (apparently not the easiest place to find Day Players who speak English and can pass for American). Understanding how difficult it was to actually bring his vision to the screen gave me a new appreciation for the guy. It's a pretty striking film regardless of it's faults and a hell of an ambitious one considering it was made for the same amount of money as a Kate Hudson vehicle aimed at the romantic crowd.

I think Kurt Wimmer has a bright future ahead of him, so long as he can work the kinks out of his writing or at least get another person involved in the storytelling process, collaborating in a way that won't compromise his vision. The edits that are currently being made to ULTRAVIOLET can only help save the movie by removing the elements that don't work and focusing on the things that do. I know I'm looking forward to seeing the finished product in theaters this summer.

[JenGe]

Psyclops said:

I think Kurt Wimmer has a bright future ahead of him, so long as he can work the kinks out of his writing or at least get another person involved in the storytelling process, ...

Ok, I'm going to take issue with this one. Personally I love his writing though I realize that not everyone will. I am sick & tired of stories that are trying too hard to be too much to everyone. It was more than refreshing to finally after years of watching films to find one consice & simple yet with many deep layers. So few are. Those who understand mythology, fairy tales, & parables will know what I am getting at. Wimmer is one of the few writers since Lucas, Philip K. Dick, Ray Bradbury, & Rod Serling who seems to understand this style of storytelling. Those who do not usually only see the simplisity but not the genus behind it.

It's the old adage, "Keep it simple stupid." This is the main reason why I do not believe that both Minority Report & Paycheck worked as well as they should have. Unneeded, unnecessary cladding was added onto Dick's simple tales.

In my hum. op. Equilibrium is what Minority Report should have been & wasn't.

More does not always equal better ...in fact, it rarely does.

Besides, judging strictly from EQ Wimmer has almost a perfect sense of tension timing which is all to often missing in modern cinema. He holds back on the "bang" and releases it at just the right moment. Too many films today just give you "bang" after "bang" after "bang" without giving you time to either process them or seduce you into them.

[Psyclops]

Well, ULTRAVIOLET wasn't simple. It tried to cram too many things into one movie and that's part of what brought it down for me. The dialogue is pure pulp, the kind of cheese you'd find in the panels of a comic book or a noir thriller with a sci-fi twist. The problem is that so much of the film works on a completely different level, something that could have been brilliant had it been played straight instead of campy. The result is a movie that feels very uneven.

Imagine if you took the strongest aesthetic elements from a movie like EQUILIBRIUM or BLADE RUNNER and then mixed it into the bubble gum world of escapist fantasy like TANK GIRL and THE FIFTH ELEMENT. The result would be something unique and interesting but not entirly successful. These problems stem from the screenplay, which doesn't just hit a beat and stay with it. It's loud, it's vibrant and it's definitely imaginative, but ultimately it doesn't live up to it's potential and that's the most frustrating part. There are brilliant ideas introduced in this movie that deserved a stronger foundation.

Thankfully, the things that don't work are being trimmed down and with a little editing, the movie could find it's rhythm. It could only get better from here. Anyway, Kurt told me that a lot can happen with a movie during the editing stage and that I probably would have laughed his original cut of EQ off the screen (not so sure about that). It's also kind of funny that you mentioned MINORITY REPORT since the two of us brought that movie up during the conversation.

[JenGe]

Psyclops said:

It's also kind of funny that you mentioned MINORITY REPORT since the two of us brought that movie up during the conversation.

Very interesting...can you share what was discussed about MR or not?? ( I don't want anything spilled about UV though.)

I found the whole film to just be filled with stuff that did not need to be there & then when I read Philip K.'s short story I realized I was right.

BTW, I do not have a problem with "pulp" dialogue. In fact I wish more films would use it & stop trying to be Shakespeare. Some of my favorite flicks ever are filled with pure pulp...Highlander, Terminator, Demolition Man, Mummy, Army of Darkness, Galaxy Quest, Total Recall, Starship Troopers, Desperado, Princess Bride... I really wish more writers would stop being afraid of it and the unfair judgements for using it.

[ntm7885]

Im absoluteley against Minority Report as a movie. I love the short story and most all Dicks works but the movie...

[TheKaiser]

JenGe not sure what you getting at with the Wimmer defense, because apart from EQ Wimmer's writing has been very typical.

I understand your points about simplistic dialouge and agree, but I don't always see it in Wimmer's work. The writer for the Indiana Jones films and a chunk of the Star Wars flms - Lawrence Kasdan totally knows how to write puply simply dialouge that works fairly effectively in EQ. But its a style that can very easily go very wrong. Examples in my opinion: Star Wars prequels, Sky Captain.

Another example of excellent pulp writing would be Frank Miller's dialouge in Sin City. Very simple, but very intense ryhthm.

I've got my expectations low for Ultraviolets narrative, but they are unbelievably high for his action. I mean if a majority of the reviews so far have problems with the writing, but still reccomend the film due to its action - well it must be pretty unbelievable.

I'm expecting something like Blade 2 - which I know isn't that well liked by some, but manages to succeed as an entertaining comic book film, despite the fairly poor pulp dialouge. It follows the "keep it simple stupid" formula, but doesn't pan out perfectly. In the long run the visuals and action make it worth the watch.

And Wimmer is absolutely right about the editing. That's what every film comes down too. Editing is absolutely more then 50% of what makes a film work. Its a good thing Wimmer is putting a lot of time into it, he may iron out the reported flaws and have something that may finally turn some heads from the mainstream audience.

One last thought about him having trouble with finding actors in China. he's going through the same thing that Jackie Chan and other Hk directors had to deal with in some of his HK action flicks. Whenever there was a british character you could tell they grabbed some proffessor from a university or what not simply because he could speak English. Happens so often in Asian films. There were some bad ones in the Project A films.

[JenGe]

TheKaiser said:

JenGe not sure what you getting at with the Wimmer defense, because apart from EQ Wimmer's writing has been very typical.

I'm really not sure what you are getting at here either. What exactly do you mean by typical?? Typical for himself or typical for films in general??

I have found over the years though that it really is difficult to judge a writer by the final cut of a film especially when often the final draft was not even theirs. The only film besides Equilibrium that stayed true to what Wimmer wrote was The Thomas Crown Affair to which he scripted the male parts. Personally I found the dialogue in that one a thrill before I even knew it was his hand that penned it.

It's funny because I was discussing this very thing with my teens the other day. I really wish that directors & writers would stop pretending that they are Mammet, Kaufman, or Soderbergh. Too many out there currently are doing a poor job at mimicking. Even Ridley Scott (Matchstick Men) & I believe Speilberg (Catch Me if You Can) have attempted it and in my hum. op. they need to leave that style to those who do it best and stick with their own even if it is "typical."

[TheKaiser]

What I mean is that Wimmer writes genre films. Which is great, but a lot of writers write genre films - I just fail to see whats so unique about it. Is it that he doesn't imitate great writers and sticks to the basics that impress you, because I agree that there are a lot imitator writers out there that churn out some forced material (Boondog Saints and other Tarantino imitators come to mind), but most Wimmer's scripts don't seem to differ to me as the standard comic book adaptionist like David Hayter or David Goyer - which doesn't mean their terrible (those are some of the best comic book adaptionists (sp?) in the industry) its just that I fail to see how Wimmer sticks out from the pack when writing is concerned.

For me its visual style and inventive imagination that really make him a promising director - his writing gets the job done, but its not his strongest quality by far. Even EQ suffered from some convolusion in the middle - though I think the editing of certain sequences caused that. (the whole gun switch debacle etc..)

[JenGe]

I think I can sum it up this way, Twilight Zone.

Twilight Zone is my all time favorite TV show ever. It still is. Nothing yet has come close to replacing it. On the surface it is simple, direct, and to the point storytelling with layers of symbolism and ideology. Few screenplay writers today really seem to know how to utilize this type of storytelling through mythos & fables. Wimmer is one of the few. Andrew Niccol is another one.

Some may think it is out dated & too simplistic but I am one of those who longs for these & eagerly looks for those writers who can fill a need that I literally starve for.

Good storytelling for me is much more than just clever dialogue but a weaving of character, mythos, symbolism, historical elements, and ideology. I tend to read short stories more than anything else such as O Henry, Ray Bradbury, Edgar Allen Poe, Philip K. Dick, and F. Scott Fitzgerald. This causes me to gravitate more to filmmakers with a similar "short story", shorthand style of narrative.

It really just boils down to the fact that my needs in a given film/director/writer/story are different than your needs
We can both be perfectly legitimate for ourselves.