As everybody said Max Payne was a major pain in the butt when it releases a couple of years back, I didn't go to the theatres to see it. Last night, it was coming on TV and I thought, hey let me give it a try and sat down to watch it. The concept wasn't too bad, but the execution is very shoddy and amateurish.
Max Payne (Mark Wahlberg) is a New York City police detective and he is haunted by the murder of his wife and baby's death even after three years. He killed two of the murderers, but couldn't kill the last one. He is a tortured soul who wants nothing more than hunting down the last murderer. During one of his routines to gather new leads and information about his family's murderer, he befriends Natasha Sax (Olga Kurylenko) who is murdered and her sister, Mona Sax (Mila Kunis) wants revenge. Jack Lupino (Amaury Nolasco) is her murderer and both Payne and Mona team up to get their revenge. But, is Lupino the real antagonist or is there someone operating behind the curtain?
First of all the cinematography is excellent - I loved the feel of the movie, the score is not overbearing. But what really is a drag, is that there is nothing in the story that drags the viewer in. The starting of the movie kind of captured my attention, but by the 30th minute, it was getting boring. Mark Wahlberg only has one expression in his face throughout the movie and it is a major pain in the ass when he portrays the same expression when he is happy with his family too. That is kind of confusing, wasn't he happy with his family when they were alive or what? Bad casting choice there and the writer seems to have no job here, as there are hardly any dialogues and whatever there is seems to be drowned out by Mr. Major Pain. Olga Kurylenko - why does so many of you think she is sexy again? She can act (Quantum Of Solace), but she isn't sexy (they should have roped in Megan Fox, now that is one hot babe) and she plays only a cameo which didn't add anything to the story. Amaury Nolasco (Prison Break) as the bald Lupino who is high on drugs, looks and acts credibly, but there is not enough scope for his acting ability. Mila Kunis is also wasted. Why were there huge man-crows (or 'angels' like they call them) flying through the skies of NYC in the minds of people? I only got it, when they showed that all of them were druggies. This film seems to be telling us not to get addicted to drugs, we get it. Move on, will you? I don't do drugs (I am a 20 year old guy) and nor will anyone else who knows what drugs can really do. The slow motion scenes were good, but there was only a couple of them and the dark angels were very cool.
Though the film was somewhat boring, I can't give it a 1, because the visual treatment was excellent and I like some of Mr. Wahlberg's previous works. By the looks of it, there seems to be a sequel coming which I definitely won't be watching if the reviews are the same as this. Don't watch this at any cost, unless you are a teenage boy and get real high seeing girl-on-girl kiss.
4/10
