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complete waste of time

Author: mark fraunhofer from New York, United States
6 June 2012
 

Normally any self respecting actor asks "Why?", not one of the actors in this complete waste of time asked this question once. They took the money and did what they were told, busy trying to look good while at it. This is a perfect example of a production that is about nothing but burning money. Starting with the writing, full of holes and completely unrealistic dialogue, but then good actors could fix that, these guys were in it only to get paid and made no effort whatsoever to raise the value of the production, so many times they just stood there waiting for the "Cut!". No one in this film believes in their character, it's all staged, shallow, unbelievable and stiff. I have many questions after watching this, all of them begin with "Why?" none of them is answered within. It's not enough to put things together by throwing money and names at it, this thing has no vision and doesn't create anything that would resemble a reality to submerse yourself in. Why would you waste your time watching this?

6 out of 11 people found the following review useful:

The dumbest script ever...an offense to our intelligence

Author: adelinne_p from Romania
6 February 2012

'nuff said in my summary! Although,I'd like to add something:Richard Gere-what were you thinking when you signed on to do this mess of a movie??? Stupid movie for people who were born yesterday and had never seen a Hollywood movie!I felt as if I were retarded watching this awful s...of a movie! Conclusion: please,don't waste your time and intelligence by watching this...1 hour and 38 minutes it can seem as 20 hours and 30 f... minutes!

I always had an admiration for Gere as an actor...just last night I saw 'Primal Fear' and was drawn into his performance...only to watch this mess the next day. I actually had confidence in this famous name,knowing about his past work.

Failed to hold our attention

Author: grandmastersik from Finland
27 July 2014

I watched this with a family member the other night and she was bored after 10 minutes. I figured that the pace would pick up and with the screenwriters' previous credits, had much higher hopes for it, but come the 30 minute mark, I was incredibly bored too.

Making a decent spy film, to me, seems to hinge on one - or a combination of - three things: great action, intelligent suspense and/or dramatic characters. The problem with this film is that the characters (or actors - take your pick) didn't bring us into their world and the action was clearly held back to play on the suspense, which, unfortunately, was pretty much void.

We're expected to believe that with all of today's crime scene nous and technology, nobody can tell the difference between a wire and knife cut, as the film's resident expert, Topher Grace, tells of how the killer doesn't cut from left-to-right, but upwards, and the reveal of Gere's real identity so early in seemed to make watching the remainder kind of pointless.

Maybe I missed something? Perhaps this big reveal was part of a mega twist near the end? Unfortunately, with 6 film channels to choose from, something this dull won't see two people in a room together reach the conclusion, and where I may go back later (having recorded it) to see if the film got any better, flicking over to the news on another station did prove vastly superior viewing.

36 out of 51 people found the following review useful:

This plot hole sums up the whole film.

Author: matt-lamellama from United Kingdom
17 January 2012

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

"Plot holes The logic by which Agent Geary "proves" that Shepherdson (Richard Gere) is Cassius is flawed. The "proof" is that Gere is in every crime scene photo, thus proving "Cassius comes back to the crime scene". But as Gere was in fact posing as investigating CIA agent, supposedly chasing Cassius, it was not only normal, but essential for him to go to all the crime scenes of Cassius' murders. "

This film is dumb. It has the budget and the actors but it can't make up for the dumb script. The actors performances were disappointing, probably because they couldn't bring themselves to believe and immerse themselves in such a lame plot.

22 out of 29 people found the following review useful:

Slow, clichéd, predictable, poorly executed

Author: Roger Foss from Norway
20 January 2012

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

Boy, how Richard Gere's career has dived since the days of American Gigolo and Internal Affairs. Yes, occasionally he shows up in a fairly good movie like Hachiko or Unfaithful, but then the superior performances are from other actors (Diane Lane, in that particular case).

This movie really shows the one-dimensional acting Gere does when given a poorly written script. Why he even bothers is mystifying.

Anyway, the movie is about Paul Sheperdson, a retired CIA agent played by Richard Gere, that once hunted down and killed 6 assassins of a group of 7. This was back in the 80s. He never got the last guy, and suddenly chose to retire.

Now 20 years later, he's asked to help track down the one who got away by working with a rookie FBI agent.

**Minor Spoiler alert** Early on, the film dispenses with mystery by revealing that Gere the retired CIA agent really is the escaped assassin himself. With that out of the way, the rest of the movie is about the rookie FBI agent getting closer and closer to finding out who the assassin is, and about Gere the assassin / CIA agent killing a few people here and there. **End Spoiler**

Of course, there is another twist towards the end. I won't say, but it feels contrived. Besides, by the time it comes you've long given up connecting to the characters, so who cares?

Problems: The major problems with this movie are: the script is poor, with gaping holes and poorly developed characters. There is absolutely no chance in hell you will ever care for any of the characters. The story is dull - you've seen it a thousand times before, and sometimes a thousand times better. The ex-spy / assassin theme doesn't resonate with anything on anybody's mind in our world, so nobody cares what happens in the movie at any point.

Direction: The film contains a few flashbacks to the 80s, where we get to see Richard Gere play Paul Sheperdson as a young agent. Except they FORGOT to make him look younger! For sure, Gere the actor looks incredible for his age (63, he's born in 1949) with his gray, full hair. But you wouldn't expect the CIA operative he plays to have the same hair color 20 years ago, would you?

The action sequences are not very exciting. Gere wielding his The acting is very bad. Topher Grace as the (supposedly brilliant) rookie FBI Agent is seriously miscast, while Richard Gere needs to ditch the action genre. Martin Sheen is there, and does an OK job I guess. No other characters will make any impression on you.

Conclusion: It doesn't suck completely, it just isn't worth your while and there are more exciting things to do.

5 out of 5 people found the following review useful:

A Very Disappointing Movie

Author: edshullivan from Canada Toronto Ontario
26 August 2013

I do enjoy a good action film with a CIA plot, however this film was filled with far too many disappointing performances. Most noticeably was the irritating musical score which I am sure was intended to keep us in suspense. Rather than keep me in suspense, I found the music's constant rise in volume the movies failed attempt to try and keep the audiences' interest from waning. Unfortunately it didn't work.

I am a big fan of Richard Gere's body of work and again I was very disappointed in his performance. "Richard, what were you thinking?"

Now let's talk about the plot. There is a Russian assassin known to the CIA by the name "Cassius". Two CIA agents the retired Paul Shepherdson (Richard Gere) who is un-retired by his former boss Tom Highland, (Martin Sheen), and a rookie CIA agent who has never been in the field Ben Geary (Topher Grace). Cassius is suspected to be dead, but when a U.S. senator is murdered the CIA believes the murder was committed by the phantom Russian assassin Cassius as evidenced by his trademark murder style of slashing the neck.

Ben Geary the rookie CIA agent wrote his thesis on Cassius and explains to his veteran partner Shepherdson that he knows everything there is to know about Cassius and the murder trademark of the senator's slashed throat is the work of Cassius, thus the two agents are assigned to find Cassius and eliminate him. Well.... this sounds like a reasonable plot to work with and one would think the next 90 minutes of action and suspense should be interesting. Unfortunately, not.

I watched the movie with my wife and we both kept looking at each other and questioning the sequence of events and the plausibility of a veteran CIA agent as Shepherdson (Gere) being such a terrible shot with a gun that he cannot shoot to kill a Russian spy who is only 15 to 20 feet in front of him. Also, for a rookie CIA agent Geary (Topher Grace) who wrote his thesis on the Russian spy Cassius, and is supposedly a genius on Cassius's Modus Operandi why he couldn't spot his new partner Shepherdson, in historical pictures of previous murder scenes in not one, not two, not three. but NUMEROUS murder scenes that the CIA investigated previously but were unsolved? Please!!!!

It is just one of those movies that you expect the story line and actors to be a lot more believable, and the musical score not to be the driver trying to entice a sense of urgency and endangerment.

This is not a movie with any value and I would compare it to the feeling you get with buying a knock off product of a name brand product. You get what you pay for, and I am sure Topher Grace's salary in his next feature film will be commensurate with his (lack of) box office draw for The Double. Save your money folks.

5 out of 7 people found the following review useful:

A Red Dragon Double

Author: thesar-2 from United States
26 February 2012

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

Well, at least The Double fulfilled my need for wanting to watch an international spy/suspense/thriller last night. Too bad it wasn't really that good of a one.

It's one of those movies that screams: "Wait for it…wait for it…waaaaait….BAM! There's our surprise! Not satisfied? We're gonna throw in another shocker…wait for it…" Mercifully, the most obvious revelation is revealed 20 minutes in, because nothing tips my chair like knowing what's coming in the first five minutes (like this movie) and having to wade through almost two hours of "twists/turns" to get to what we knew all along.

Believe it or not, this wasn't a direct to video release. Someone had enough faith in this film to release it to theatres in 2011, albeit limited, and someone further believed in it enough to market it hard on DVD. But, here's the problem: it's trying hard to be similar to Red Dragon. Only, that's not a movie I would like to imitate.

Let's see if the synopsis sounds vaguely familiar: Yet another EX-CIA agent – why is it always "This is my last job before retirement" or "You know I quit, I can't go back, I won't go back, well okay, here I come"? – is called back into the line of duty once a Senator gets killed with the same MO as a previously-thought-dead Soviet Super-Assassin Spy. Yet another pairing has to take place between that Ex-CIA agent and a yet another younger book-smart unwanted partner. Together, the yet another good-cop/bad-cop pair track the assassin known as "Cassius" when he could be closer than they think.

In all seriousness, it wasn't a downright terrible film. It was well shot, the acting wasn't great, but not atrocious and if you leave your brain at the door and forget about the 30+ movies this mimics, you might have a good time.

6 out of 10 people found the following review useful:

Ridiculous.

Author: tpaladino from United States
8 February 2012

I knew in the first ten minutes that this was a bad movie, bit I tried hard to make it through the end. I was unsuccessful.

It tries to be a cool spy flick, but completely fails on nearly every level. It's just done wrong. The dialog is hackneyed and unrealistic, as are the situations that the characters are put into. I just couldn't suspend my disbelief at any point long enough to get into the story.

Topher Grace is terrible in this. He's simply not believable as an FBI agent, even one that's a snotty know-it-all with a masters degree. Richard Gere and Martin Sheen tried their best to work with the material given, but to no avail.

Shame too, because other than Topher Grace, there's a solid cast and a half-decent premise. It's completely let down however by sub-par writing and consistently poor directorial choices.

Not worth watching, even on Netflix. There are plenty of WAY more interesting films in this genre to waste time with this turkey.

1 out of 1 people found the following review useful:

Sorry Richard but you're not convincing anyone

Author: newton_kerry from United Kingdom
26 July 2013

I was hoping for much more from this film Richard Greer usually plays his parts well but I think he isn't cut out as a grizzled retired CIA agents, he just lacks conviction. His character was straight out of any old movie with the same role except he was very bland and almost one dimensional.

His only saving grace was that he appears to have a soft side for his side kick Geary which later becomes clear the reason why.

The plot lacks pace especially cutting back and forth with flash backs that don't make sense, and to be honest I didn't think added anything to the telling of the story in fact I felt spoilt it to the point I predicted the ending with the exception of one twist.

The ending is surprising but doesn't really explain Geary's theory about Cassius. There are a lot of holes in the plot and the identity of Cassius is revealed early on, the question then is do you carry on to find out why he does what he does, or turn it off. I opted to carry on watching but only halfheartedly.

Shame I like Richard Greer but not convinced he's cut out play this particular role.

3 out of 5 people found the following review useful:

More like a high school production

Author: Ted Gottis from United States
29 April 2012

I am a Richard Gere fan and have high hopes for Topher Grace, but this film did neither of them justice.

The movie has a promising premise. Cold War Soviet spy on the move. Soon, however the staged scenarios and attempts at surprise fall so short they become comical. I had to laugh when Martin Sheen is buying coffee and is standing conspicuously to the left as if, yes, Richard Gere pops in the space on the right to a "startled" Martin Sheen. The whole movie was done the same way. You knew what was going to happen before it happened.

Without continuing to bash this film, I would ask Hollywood to give their viewers a little credit. Make the plot and sequence surprises actual surprises, not ones that are contrived and unbelievable. Remember, we want to believe.