Movie Defense Force: Rampage

Jimothy Sterling

New member
Apr 18, 2011
5,976
0
0
Rampage

Most of you will know Uwe Boll for BloodRayne, or Postal, or any number of critically mauled videogame films. He did, however, make this non-game related foray into American violence ... and it's really not bad at all.

Watch Video
 

Ariseishirou

New member
Aug 24, 2010
443
0
0
Nice review, Jim. Haven't seen it, but based on the clips you showed, there's just one problem in taking that one seriously in terms of gritty realism: why is everyone Hollywood thin?

I don't live in America but I've traveled there often and at no point have I ever walked through an American city or small town and encountered nothing but people with sub-20 BMIs. It just smacks "dude goes on a rampage and kills a bunch of actors" as opposed to "dude goes on a rampage and kills and bunch of people" to me and ruins the suspension of disbelief.
 

SonOfVoorhees

New member
Aug 3, 2011
3,509
0
0
Saw this movie a few times, its awesome, clever in its way with the ending. How the main character planned everything and how he did it. Worse part is, he is a likable guy.

Uwe boll seems to make good movies when he writes them himself. I enjoyed (well it was good, but very dark) movie Seed, and Tunnel Rats is a good Vietnam war movie set in the tunnels the Viet Cong dug, and the nightmare the soldiers faced fighting in them. Ive nor seen Darfur as yet, but thats supposed to be good as well.

Just seems his game related movies suck ass.
 

Ariseishirou

New member
Aug 24, 2010
443
0
0
DVS BSTrD said:
I wouldn't call this American violence, I'd call it violence.
But everyone's speaking in an American accent.

Hollywood thin? Really? I must live in Hollywood then.
Where do you live, then? CDC stats list the average BMI of every single state but Utah as overweight, and Utah is under by a sliver (http://www.insureme.com/insurance/bmi-index-state)>

You've obviously never eaten in a StarBucks during an election year.
I think it's "Starbucks" and yes, I absolutely have. And there were plenty of fat people in it. Or are you suggesting that they stuff them full of thin people on purpose during election years for the cameras? Because that proves my point, really.
 

Hatchet90

New member
Nov 15, 2009
705
0
0
I saw this one a couple years ago at the request of friends and other online personalities. I have to say that I quite enjoyed it. I would also recommend that people watch it.
 

sirjeffofshort

New member
Oct 2, 2012
117
0
0
I've honestly always liked this movie.

I think a huge problem I've had with Uwe is that as he got better at making movies, they went from being entertainingly bad to just plain bad. If everything he'd done had stayed at "House of the Dead" levels of horrible I would own his entire library. Instead he actually started to develop a style... albeit a style that was in direct confrontation with the properties he chose to work with. This movie had proven to me that he can pull off a film and do it well, he just needs the proper (and hopefully original, so he's not crushing any fans dreams) subject matter.

...either that or he's a genius of Andy Kaufman-esque proportions and he's just been trolling us on purpose, which I also find plausible being as he's somehow been able to find amazing actors to be in his films (read: Ben Kingsly) and gotten them to give the worst performance of their lives (read: Bloodrayne).
 

thetenet

New member
Mar 12, 2008
19
0
0
Looks like the suit was inspired by The Red Spectacles of Mamuro Oshi. Another great film which the anime Jin Roh comes from. Good stuff to know about.
 

Lev The Red

New member
Aug 5, 2011
454
0
0
great video, but i have one issue with something you said (though, i may be over-thinking it).

is Bill really an anti-hero? anti-heroes, while not totally heroic, have some redeeming qualities. they may use questionable methods, have controversial opinions or world views, but they ultimately do/are trying to do good. Bill doesn't really have any redeeming qualities, and definitely doesn't have a positive impact on his world. he's just someone who is (perhaps rightfully so) angry at the society he lives in, so he starts killing it.

Bill is the protagonist of Rampage, sure, but that doesn't mean he's a hero. Stories don't have to have heroes (A Clockwork Orange), and the heroes don't have to be the protagonist (Richard III)

edit - i take back what i said. an english-major friend of mine says that antiheroes don't have to be redeeming.
 

shrekfan246

Not actually a Japanese pop star
May 26, 2011
6,374
0
0
Haven't seen it myself (or any other Boll movies to my recollection), but this is one of the few Boll films I've heard get positive reactions, and pretty much the only one that I've heard received quite a large number of positive reactions. I believe it's his highest ranked IMDb listing (though I could easily be wrong).

Funny that he still managed to use the name of a video game franchise for it, though.
 

gphjr14

New member
Aug 20, 2010
868
0
0
Oddly enough I watched like 30 seconds of this yesterday on Netflix before rewatching the new Archer episodes. Netflix has been suggesting this for 2 years now and maybe I'll give it a chance.
 

MortisLegio

New member
Nov 5, 2008
1,258
0
0
My only complaint with the film is the ending.

The whole reason for the violence was to hide a bank robbery. Seriously, that's why the character killed all those people was to steal a bunch of cash. I think it would have been better if the character had just been living out some strange psychotic fantasy.

Though I do think this is a very well done film, and definitely Uwe Boll's best film, recent events have made it very difficult to show to other people.
 

Canadamus Prime

Robot in Disguise
Jun 17, 2009
14,334
0
0
I haven't seen that movie, but I already know that serial killers are human. That's what makes their actions all the more disturbing.
 

Frybird

New member
Jan 7, 2008
1,632
0
0
Sorry...no, just no.

Just because Rampage is not nearly as awful as...Bloodrayne or something, it doesn't mean that it isn't bad.

It's really...really awful.

The acting is mediocre, but otherwise it is badly written thanks to the endless rambling of the protagonists and the thinly veiled two dimensionality of the people around him, awfully directed and highly unengaging (trying to avoid "boring" here because i do not want to imply a film about a homicidal rampage has to be "fun"). In the end, i'd argue that the movie is in a way even worse than his usual output because you cannot even really make fun of it.

Having a movie taking it's subject matter seriously and not being exploitative may be an indication that a movie MIGHT be good, but it doesn't make it so. And Rampage is a prime example.

Avoid.
 

Tumedus

New member
Jul 13, 2010
215
0
0
Haven't seen it but I can say that I absolutely despise the overuse of shaky-cam. It can be employed to great effect when used sparingly and with restraint, but intentionally wobbling the camera all over the place is just irritating and a sign of shoddy film making.
 

Stryc9

Elite Member
Nov 12, 2008
1,294
0
41
I heard somewhere years ago that most if not all of Uwe Boll's movies were part of some sort of German tax write off scheme and that they were intentionally shitty so they wouldn't make their money back.

The only Uwe Boll movie I've intentionally watched was Postal because the RWS guys had were fairly involved in the making of it and it knew that it was going to be shit so it just kind of reveled in it which helped it turn out to be pretty alright by videogame movie standards.