Film Review #9: Moneyball

     I've been excited to review this movie, I cannot tell a lie. Those who know me, know that I love baseball. So I've obviously read Michael Lewis' book to which this film is based. Don't fret however, I'm not one of those people that can't seperate the book from the movie, I won't sit here and complain that the film doesn't even mention the draft which is what most of the book focuses on or that the Ray Durham and Cliff Floyd deals weren't mentioned even in the slightest. No that's not my thing the book is a book and the film is a film related only by the title they both hold.

     Moneyball, tells the true story of the 2002 Oakland Athletics team, and their controversial GM (at the time anyway) Billy Beane (played by Brad Pitt). After a 2001 season that saw the A's lose in the postseason to the New York Yankees, 3 of their best players leave for free agency in leadoff man and stolen base threat Johnny Damon, Power bat with a .477 OBP Jason Giambi and closer Jason Isringhausen. So Beane has to find a way to replace them, working within a constricted budget, the A's spent 41 million that season, 7 of which went to Jermaine Dye.

     Moneyball was directed by Capote director Bennett Miller and stars the previously mentioned Brad Pitt as well as Phillip Seymour Hoffman as A's manager Art Howe and Jonah Hill as Peter Brand, a fictionalized composite of Beane's assistants, mostly based upon Paul DePodesta, Beane's assistant GM. In the film Brand is the one that brings the Moneyball strategy to Beane's attention after the youngster impresses the A's GM when he goes into a meeting with Mark Shapiro, GM of the Cleveland Indians, and Brand's then employer, and single handedly talks Shapiro out of a trade. Shortly thereafter Brand is hired by the A's and moneyball takes over.

     Quick side note about moneyball. It's a baseball strategy that values wins and runs above the players themselves, it was always about the player's statistics and not what they brought to the team. This allowed the A's to field a competitive team despite a low payroll because everyone undervalued these players thus allowing the A's to grab them at a low price.

     So after Beane and Brand carry on with the moneyball strategy they decide they can not replace a player like Giambi so they take the collective on-base-percentage of their 3 departing free agents and replace them with 3 new players, in this case Scott Hatteberg, the catcher turned 1st baseman; David Justice, aging slugger whose best days are behind him; and Randy Verlade, an underacheiving 3rd baseman.

     After a rough start to the season by the A's, Beane is definitely feeling the pressure. All the old school baseball scouts on the A's staff shun Beane and his ideals, the owner is peeved at his inability to put a winning team on the field and the manager, angry about his own contract situation, doesn't field the team Beane wants (including not having Scottie H. at first). Prompting Beane to clean house and hope that his team can turn it around, somehow, someway.

     At this point in his career you know what you're going to get with Brad Pitt, he's charasmatic and definitely the best choice of all the big name celebs to play the role of the unorthodox and unpredictable role of Billy Beane. I didn't expect much from Jonah Hill given what I've seen of his forays into the serious roles. He was okay, but unspectacular and the whole movie is kind of centralized on him, so it's hard to overlook, but you still manage to do so thanks to Aaron Sorkin's brilliant scripting.

     The baseball scenes looked realistic, which is generally hard to pull off in sports movies, let alone baseball, the most fundamentally sound sport in the athletic stratosphere (*Bias). Mind you that's thank to the casting of ex-MLB players in the less prominant roles. Thus the baseball looks real without having the movie dragged down by terrible acting. The only real problem I had with this movie was the character of Art Howe, being Hoffman's character I expected him to be the scene stealer but really he just stood there most of the time. I've grown to expect better from an actor of his caliber but it's as if his Capote cohort begged him to be in the movie because the other guy the got dropped out at the last minute.

     So apart from some minor flaws this movie turns out to be a good time, it's got enough baseball in it to attract those who are fans of the game but the movie doesn't overly focus on statistics that the casual fan or people new to the sport will get lost in. Bonus points given out to any of you that can succesfully explain WAR, UZR and DIPS. Never in the last 20 years has there been a baseball movie with so much emotion and depth that Moneyball brings to the sport. It's clear the days of Major League, Bull Durham and Eight Men Out are long gone but one can only hope the success of Moneyball brings back the trend and allows more baseball movies to be greenlit by studios. The success only hinge's on a couple Oscar noms for a well deserved crew behind the camera headlined by the adapted screenplay Sorkin has wowed us with, and the sharp wit Brad Pitt lends to Billy Beane's character.

Film Review #8: Fair Game

     What a crazy weekend we've put together for you here on The Melancholy Club, I hope you haven't fallen too far behind with the film reviews, so for those of you who haven't let's keep the train rolling with my review of Fair Game...

     Fair Game is a biographical film based on the true story of Joe Wilson and Valerie Plame Wilson as outlined in the latter's book "Fair Game: My Life as a Spy, My Betrayal by the White House"

     Valerie Plame (played by Naomi Watts) is an undercover operative for the Central Intelligence Agency married to a former US diplomat, who most recently served as an ambassador to African nation Gabon. He also has ties to the nation of Niger, and this is where the story really takes flight.

     Plame and her CIA cohorts, as it were, are investigating the alledged WMD (that's weapons of mass destruction for our friends that are globally unaware of everything) manufacturing that is believed to be happening by Iraq. The only problem is, the United States Government has absolutely no proof of this other than the fact that Iraq had purchased some aluminum tubes that could possibly be used for nuclear weapon fabrication, but most likely will be used for rocket powered artillary. But the american people are still feeling uneasy about the transaction so they opt (after some convincing to Plame) to hire her husband Joe Wilson (played by Sean Penn) to go to Niger and investigate a possible yellowcake uranium purchase by Iraq from Niger since Wilson has ties to the Niger government from his time there.

     After his investigation Wilson notes that there is no possible way that Niger can sell the amount of uranium required to Iraq without some sort of paper trail cropping up (They'd need 40% more uranium than Niger is used to mining.) To his surprise however, mear months after his journey to Niger the president brings up the very opposite at the State Of The Union adress, stating that Niger is selling large amounts of uranium to Iraq. After some digging and investigating by Wilson, he finds out that they have no new evidence of a uranium sale since his trip to Niger. So he takes matters into his own hands by writing an article in the New York Times stating the president is lying to everyone and there is no uranium. Now this doesn't sit well with the heads of state, so they begin to look for a way to discredit Wilson.

Now the tactic they use, isn't what we would call "legal" as the government writes an article of their own saying Wilson was never on a mission by the CIA, but rather a vacation paid for by the CIA thanks to his wife's work as a spy. Now this revelation doesn't sit well with Wilson and Plame, Wilson for being discredited as a liar and Plame because well her life as she knows it is over as she is under constant surveillance, she's removed from her position at the CIA, receives daily death threats and has a strain placed on her personal relationships (especially with her husband.)

     Now this movie is good, not amazing, not even super good, but it's worth a watch. There is just enough thrills to keep you entertained, while at the same time not being overly political to lose the audience that is less than savvy when it comes to politics. The acting is stellar, as the supporting cast is your usual white house cast of characters, and those who know me know that I hardly ever have a bad thing to say about Naomi Watts, even in her bad movies, she's the best of a bad situation and that makes her one of my favorite actress's. Sean Penn's character comes off as a whiny bitch most of the time, which is odd, it's not until near the end of the film that we see some diverse emotions coming from him. That's not to say that Penn's acting is bad, because Sean Penn is such a good character actor that I'm pretty sure he can pull almost anything off.

     The end result however, comes down to Doug Liman's directing. As far as I'm concerned he is one of the most underrated directors in the business as he continues to be able to direct all different types of films (The Bourne Identity, Swingers and Jumper) although he's very likely to never replicate the awesomeness that was Go. Overall you should watch this movie, it's old enough that you can likely find it on the cheap at your local video store, or you can download it or watch it online somewhere I'm sure (Legal warning: I do not condone movie piracy... So long as no one knows...)

Film Review #7 : 30 Days Of Night

     Following my recent trend I thought I would continue to watch graphic novel based vampire movies and today I worked up the courage to watch 30 Days Of Night...

     30 Days Of Night is as I understand it is a survival horror based of a mini-series of comic books written by Steve Niles and Ben Templesmith. Again I only had time to read the first comic before I watched the movie, but it appears that the movie at least attempts to follow the story line.

     Lets jump straight to the plot, this is a franchise thick with backstory and imagination. Our story starts in Barrow, Alaska, the town "at the top of the world", just as the townspeople are preparing for a month long night, 30 days of night. The town population drops by about four hundred people as most of the residents leave for other cities. The few that stay behind are greeted by a stranger (Ben Foster) that wandered into town covered in dirt and grime, strangely after all the sled dogs were murdered. As soon as the stranger asks for a bowl of raw hamburger meat things start going downhill. Small things at first, vandalism, a couple violent deaths, a head on a stick or two, then the power goes out, and the town is plunged into total darkness. The local sheriff (Josh Hartnett) discovers the first body, or lack there of, and urges the townsfolk into their homes and to prepare their weapons, it does them little good of course as the town soon erupts into an orgie of blood and fire, you see a band of vampires has followed the stranger into town.

     This franchise completely redesigned the classic vampire. Gone are the suave, romantic bloodsuckers, these vampires are the ultimate apex predator, six times faster and stronger than a human, with a mouth full of razor sharp fangs and claws sharp enough to punch through a skull. This I believe is the closest a vampire can get to reality. These vampires led by Marlow (Danny Huston) are more than a match for a town of a hundred and fifty humans, and now that the sun has set the town is theirs for 30 days. All survivors have to risk it all just to last the month.

     As I sit here stirring coffee and cream into my sugar I realize that the movie isn't about the vampires, its about human nature, about sacrifices and the lengths of which we will go to protect those we love. Throughout the movie the characters are forced to put aside their lives and push themselves to the limit just to survive, when their friends and family are dead or undead is when they find their strength. It takes a bit to see past the darkness and find the moral of the story, but the darkness is what makes the movie.

     Darkness, yes, as the title states the sun has set, turning the town into a veritable hell, the dark sky and pure white snow are often contrasted beautifully by the stunning red of blood and fire, brightening what is otherwise a bland colour palette. The acting is refreshingly believable and for I never quite figured out if the film was completely CGI or if the picture was just that sharp even on my horribly old SD TV.

     My final judgement is that the acting was near top notch, the characters were believable, the vampires were fresh and the plot was thick enough to create a beautifully complex story, so pick it up but make sure you leave the lights on...
   

Film Review #6: Killer Joe

     I would like to thank all you readers first and foremost for pushing this blog past the 100 view mark (Triple digits what!?!) So to thank you I'll be reviewing a movie that isn't even in theatres yet. Now I know what you're thinking... Conscious you must pirate movies! No, kind readers I do not. I just simply am lucky enough to live in close proximity to Toronto and have a nice enough sister to take me to TIFF (Toronto International Film Festival). So how new is this movie? It doesn't even have a trailer yet so here's a clip and let's get on with the review of Killer Joe.

     Killer Joe is the story of a gambling obsessed man that gets in a little too deep with a bookie and all of a sudden has to come up with 5000 dollars or he'll be killed. So he does what any desperate man would do... He gets a bank loan, I'm totally kidding that wouldn't make for a very good movie, he does the more sensible thing, hires a hitman to kill his mother to collect her insurance money.

     Now here's what I want you to do before you go into the theatre to watch this movie, I want you to imagine your favorite Cohen Brothers movie (Fargo, Raising Arizona and Burn After Reading are all solid choices) and multiply everything by 10. This is how much fun this movie is. It's bloody, it's brilliant. It's bloody brilliant.

     So this dude with a gambling debt (played by Emile Hirsch, Into The Wild and Alpha Dog) needs cash and gets the brilliant idea to hire a hitman to kill his mother in order to collect the insurance, which is in his little sister Dottie's (played brilliantly by Juno Temple) name, to pay off his bookie.

     Now Emile Hirsch's character, Chris, isn't very bright, this much is apparent neither is his father, Ansel (played by Thomas Haden Church, Spiderman 3) or his step-mother Sharla. They're your sterotypical white trash southern family, sharing everything (and I mean EVERYTHING) if there was a movie about Dunnville folk, this would be it (Zing!) As the movie goes on you realize however that Dottie is not stupid by any means despite her childish actions, but I'm getting ahead of myself...

     So after the family decides to kill their mother/wife and split the rest of the insurance money between them, after the hitman's deductible, they make a call to a Dallas Marshall named Joe Cooper (the aforementioned "Killer Joe" played by Matthew McConaughey). Now Joe has killed before and he has a set of rules that he needs to follow, no exceptions made. So when he finds out the family can't pay him his money in advance he decides to walk out on the job, except he took a liking to Dottie and decides to use her as a retainer for his services rendered, he gets access to Dottie (very full access) until a point in time comes where he gets paid. The family reluctantly agree, but start to decide it's not such a good idea.

     Now the acting in this film was outstanding, partly because of the script they had was so strong to begin with, also partly because they clearly trusted their director and just went with the flow. But the story went so far and above my expectations. This movie was hilarious, surprisingly so, and it was very gory which worked so well for what they were aiming for. McConaughey's character was by far the most stale, however being a hitman and not having the southern charm of the other characters, it's not all that surprising and kinda works for the movie.

     So this film has action, comedy, thrills, chills and nudity (A little too much, but whose complaining?) which makes for an unpredictable, and fun movie going experience that had everyone in the 4000 person theatre howling with laughter, gasping with fear, and tilting on the edge of their seats.

     I'm not sure if this is the best movie released in 2011 that I've seen so far this year, but if it isn't it's pretty damn close.

Film Review #5 : Priest

     In a post-apocalyptic world, a savage war between man and vampire has raged for centuries.  A warrior priest receives word of fresh attacks, but now its personal; his niece has been kidnapped by a new hive of merciless  vampires. To save her, he must break his vow of peace and hunt down the hive before its too late. Based on the acclaimed graphic novel and packed with bloodthirsty action, this full throttle crusade takes you on the hunt for a deadly new breed of killer.

     Priest, like all movies based off of graphic novels, it does so loosely, which may be disappointing to some viewers but it allows for unbiased opinions of both the film and series of novels. Rather than get in depth with the differences between them lets just say you don't have to see one before the other but rather see/read both of them if you have the time.

     Those of you with two brain cells to rub together have figured out that I enjoyed the movie, I didn't see it in theaters and truthfully have only read the first volume of the series, but that doesn't mean it is without flaws...

     So Priest, a movie directed by Scott Stewart, is based (loosely as stated) on a Korean comic series of the same name. The plot is as follows; since the beginning of time, or shortly there after, humanity has waged a war with vampires. Not your run of the mill vampires, I would say somewhat a middle ground between the Underworld vampire and the 30 Days of Night vampire. "The eyes are the window to the soul" as some say and due to the fact that vampires are born without eyes they are said to have no soul, so they are hunted. I guess you could almost say that this is a retelling of our own history when we ran the native Americans to near extinction and put them in reserves, well the same thing has been done to vampires, but only with the help of the priests. The Priests are a sect of chosen warriors trained by the church in the deadly arts and raised with a healthy hatred for all things fangey, the are the sole reason humanity won the war but after the war they were disbanded and sworn to peace. The Priests were ordered to return to human ways and sought employment but had no skills for anything but warfare, thus they got low level jobs and fade into history. Oh yes did I mention that the war between races has destroyed the very earth? Well yeah, the cities of the past stand as grim reminders of humanities folly in a never-ending desert of pain and sacrifice, while the majority of the world has hidden behind the walls surrounding church governed cities.

     So vampires, rise from the reserves and kill (SPOILER ALERT) Paul Bettany's character's brother and his wife, before kidnapping their daughter and galavanting away on a train full of an army of vampires and assorted cutlery. I was actually quite surprised when the movie turned out to have a couple plot twists, I was expecting a straight forward hack and slash adventure that would sit on my DVD shelf and collect dust and hatred. It turns out that before he was inducted into the Priests, the main character actually had time to have a child, whom he had to sacrifice along with his lover to a life of warfare and servitude. It creates a small amount of sympathy towards the protagonist and builds a more complex plot line, and I think Paul Bettany pulled it off rather well. The other characters however were a whole other story, some lines seemed false even forced, I mean it was obvious acting, I wouldn't have been surprising if they had been reading the script off of cue cards.

     Actors aside, lets hit the visuals. I was satisfied with the camera angles and CGI, but there were quite a few slow motion shots that left me wondering why they even bothered wasting the money. Sure slow it down so we can see how he guts the hive guardian, but trying to create emotion with a two second slow motion shot when the daughter and sheriff kiss didn't work. Another criticism, the characters rarely had actual names, the protagonist and antagonist seemed just labels, I mean Priest and Black Hat? Thats not even worth hiring writers for, its like they just used the short forms off the script and ran with it. Also it seemed they stole a little bit of everything with this movie, Black Hat was an exact copy of Jericho cross from Deathwatch, as well as the trains, they even stole the scene when the damsel in distress hides the table knife in her sleeve.

     All in all Priest had an interesting back story, tasty action sequences, a palatable score, and one thing I love, a post apocalyptic earth. Although it was hard not to miss the overused slo-mo, questionable acting, and trademark violations. This is at most a buy at least a download, Cory Goodman next time focus on reading not writing. If you enjoyed this for its post apocalyptic setting and bible toting then check out the Book of Eli, if you loved the vampire action then watch the Underworld Series and if you were left completely disappointing than maybe the comics will redeem the franchise.

Film Review #4: Straw Dogs

     I realize I've been neglecting this blog as of late, what with no posts in the last 11 days. But as a thank you for being so patient with me expect lots of film reviews from now until the end of the weekend. So let's get things started with a review of the remake of a 1971 thriller called Straw Dogs.

     Straw Dogs tells the story of a big city couple (Husband, James Marsden, is a Hollywood Screenwriter and Wife, Kate Bosworth, is a TV Actress) going back to Bosworth's hometown in the deep south after they purchased her deceased father's farmland. Things then go awry when they hire Bosworth's high school boyfriend Charlie, played by Alexander Skarsgard of Tru Blood fame, to fix the roof of the farms barn.

     Now I've never seen the original "Straw Dogs" but I do not need to see the original to know that James Marsden is no Dustin Hoffman (Those terrible Focker movies aside) and nothing needs to be said about Kate Bosworths involvement in this film, now I was a fan of Bosworth's acting in the early 00's, back before Superman Returns and when she weighed more than 12 pounds, but she's done nothing of note since 2008's 21, which was minor involvement at best.

     Skarsgard was a surprise to me, now having a penis and all I can't say I've seen much of True Blood (in fact I've seen next to nothing of it) but in my opinion Skarsgard's character was the center of this movie, and more or less the only well thought out and played character.

     Apart from Skarsgard the only other thing that was impressive about this movie is the way the director Rod Lurie used football and hunting as backdrops to the violent behaviour being exhibited by the residents of Blackwater, Mississippi. For every shot deer you see, you imagine a drunken James Woods beating a man senseless in a bar, for every bone crunching football tackle you think back to the brutal rape scene witnessed only minutes before.

     Overall this film does seem unsure on whether it wants to be a thinking man's film or an exciting thriller, hence why you get the impression the film is taking an anti-violence stance but then it litters the screen with gunshots, nails, and slit throats.

     Now as mentioned there wasn't a lot to like in this film, but that doesn't mean it is necessarily a bad film, sure the beginning drags (for a long time) and the cast and visuals are less than stellar but overall it was a decent film, worth a watch eventually, but not something that needs to be rushed. Which apparently most agree with given the poor box office numbers this past weekend (apparently I was one of 24 people to go see it!)

     So yeah, everyone has a breaking point... But what is Straw Dogs'?

Film Review #3: Contagion

     Warning: This may contain spoilers, I don't think there are any but your definition of a spoiler may differ than mine, I have however learned that I'm always right so I have wasted your time with this blurb unfortunetly....

     Contagion tells the story of a super infectious (and lethal) airborne virus, or at least they'd like you to believe that's what they're telling but really this is a character film heavy in dialogue (a la Social Network) that doesn't really rely on much else.

     That however does not take away from what this movie is... and that is quite frankly the best epidemic film Hollywood has churned out in recent memory (Suck it Outbreak!) The film is a "horror" film as described by its filmmaker Steven Soderbergh (Ocean's Thirteen, Traffic) although I don't entirely agree with Steven (We're on a first name basis cause we're cool like that) I don't disagree either. Truth be told if he wants to call this a horror movie, he has all the power to do so, I will just call it the most believeable zombie movie of all time.

     The film follows basically 4 different characters lives... The first of which is that of Mitch Emhoff (played by Matt Damon). Mitch is a Minneapolis man living with his wife and step-son, and the first to be hit by this mysterious virus... Not that he gets infected, he's immune to the virus, his wife on the other hand, not so much after her death he forces himself to a life of confinement to protect his daughter who came to live with him after the death of his wife. Mitch is the character in this film you can't help but sympathize (or empathize  with, after all he's been through you just want it to be over so he can go on with his life.

     The second character we follow is Dr. Leonora Orantes (played by Marion Cotillard), a World Health Organisation Agent sent out to Hong Kong to try to trace the virus and find out it's cause thus allowing them to (hopefully) find a vaccine, so for the better part of the movie she's pouring over security footage of the Casino that Mrs. Emhoff (played by Gwenyth Paltrow) stayed at, and I found them to be some of the most entertaining footage of the film (Kinda like a Where's Waldo for a deadly virus) unfortunetly for her, she dissapears halfway through the movie and you almost forget of her existence before she pops up on screen again.

     The third character is an internet blogger named Alan Krumwiede (played by Jude Law) that is always in search of the truth, and some money and most importantly loves a good scandal, even if he has to cause it. Basically he searches for conspiracy theories that he can manipulate to make the most out of them, and by most I mean monetary (Dolla Dolla Billz Yall!.)

     The fourth character isn't so much a character but a group of them let's just call it Centers for Disease Control and Prevention peeps. This is the center searching for the cure to the unknown virus all the while dealing with a scandal caused by Laurence Fishburne's character and keeping Mr. Krumwiede off their asses and controlling the people so they don't riot and loot out the major US cities.

     What I liked most is the way the story was driven by the characters and not the other way around, most disaster films are driven by the disaster itself whereas this films allows the characters to interact while the virus unfolds in the background. Although most disaster films are not believable, this one has that factor which works well for it and has you showering in hand sanitizer hours later in fact I didn't even want to touch the door going into the bathroom while watching the film.


     Overall this film is good, it has the choppy plot lines reminiscent of Soderbergh's old work (Ocean's Eleven and Traffic) with the old school charm of those totally rad '70's disasters movie (Recommended: Towering Inferno) I'd recommend it if you dug movies such as Outbreak, Eagle Eye and Dawn Of The Dead... Otherwise I'd skip this movie at your local Blockbuster...

You'd be missing out though

Review : Medal Of Honor

     First off, apologies for not having posted the Thor review, the torrent I ran for five days turned out to require a special media player, and seeing as how I already have about four different media playing programs, I'm thinking thats not gonna happen. But I recently purchased Medal Of Honor, the newest one obviously, for PS3 and I picked it up cheap, not that the price means I won't critique the shit out of it.

     I understand that Medal Of Honor is a heavily lauded franchise, I do, but Its a niche game. MoH has always been a historical orientated game, focusing more on past battle than modern combat. With the arrivals of other, possibly better franchises (Battlefield, Call Of Duty, etc) Medal Of Honor was in need of a comeback, a game that would knock the socks off the competition and win back the hearts of their straying fanbase. Well this isn't that game.

     First off this game has the basis of a very good game, its interesting. The whole idea is that off a new type of soldier, Tier 1, these guys are supposed to be living, breathing, precision instruments of war. Thats badass. You get to step into the shoes of... well truthfully its not that interesting, I mean every character you play as, in damn near every game is lauded as the best of the best, but these guys are supposed to be real. These guys are pounding dust over in Afghanistan, blazing the trail for our boys to win the war. Over the course of the game you'll be in control of a member of two four man groups of these Tier 1 operators, Rabbit and Deuce. Not the most awe inspiring names for supersoldiers but I'm sure there has been worse. These groups are chock full of bearded army specialists, and you'll need to be just as good. Supposedly these so called operators actually helped EA design the game, so everything they do, you do, and some of the missions are actually (loosely I'm sure) based on real missions. Thats a one up for me, I love the fact that they had real life experts helping with mission design.

     So gameplay, the graphics are standard, I mean, they aren't going to win any awards but you're not going to find yourself waiting for the textures to load, and you won't be dropping frames everytime you shoot off a particularly large rocket. The weapons are cool but they appear out of perspective, by that I mean when you pick up an AK-47 that should weigh about 9.5lbs with an empty magazine, its seems smaller than real life, the recoil is reduced and you'll never find a weapon dropped by an enemy that has anything more than iron sights. Besides that you have preset weapons for every mission, no customization and if you pick up a weapon off an enemy you cannot ask your teammates for ammo, as they have different guns than you. But with the ability to ask your teammates for ammo you rarely have to resort to picking up the sub standard weapons that you're being shot with.

     The version I picked up comes with a PS3 exclusive port of Medal Of Honor Frontline, which I have never played, so as soon as I clean up some space on my HDD I'm sure it will be a bonus. Speaking of extras the game is extremely limited, offering only credits and cinematics for replay even when you finish the single player campaign. The campaign, being all that I have experienced so far, is short. I wasn't even sure that the game was actually over even when the credits were rolling. Speaking of credits this is one of maybe two times I have not skipped them, seeing as how Linkin Park's "Catalyst" was playing. Overall the campiagn was a nice balance of extremely long range sniping, ambushes, city fights, aerial combat,  and shotgun gallery caves. That being said everytime the mission changed it seemed I was a different character, and I quickly lost track of my progress. Every new mission also seemed to bring about a new frustration, the learning curve for this game was insane, I mean I didn't know I had a pistol until the last mission. In some places there was a weapon required for the situation that the game forgot to mention and after seven tries and a three day hiatus I finally figured out that L2 was hellfire missile. When sniping it reminds you that you have to keep range and wind patterns in mind to hit your target, then only punishes you by making you over compensate for the insane wavering scope and miss half your shots.

     When I first play a game I play on the easiest difficulty, I'm a firm believer of having fun and learning the game before I get to brag that I played it on Chuck Norris mode. Even though I played on easy I found my ass in my hands more often than I would want, all for stupid reasons though. I really wonder what happened to the health bar, this red screen has destroyed the functionality of many recent games, but in this case there is barely even a red screen. Frequently I found myself charging into a cave only to find out that I was in the danger zone and died before taking two steps. In some situations I lost site of the objective and wandered past the operational objective and the game just decided to fuck me for leaving my teammates behind.

     While we're on the topic of optics and the HUD, lets talk about identifiers. Your teammates have a symbol above their heads, based on your current squad and how many times they can resupply you. That would all be peachy if it stayed there, your HUD is a toggle for some reason, and I found myself lost or in horrible friendly fire situations more than I would had my teammates had a sign on their backs saying "shoot me". Once you figure out you can toggle the HUD the games smooths out a bit and becomes more playable but don't expect standard FPS action, this is a combat simulator, which means you're going to get killed, a lot. You can't just run in guns blazing and expect the enemies to bow down to your huge muscles, this game is unforgiving like that. The other half would be forgetting, MoH likes to forget to tell you things, oh like where your spotter wandered off to. Half the game I was walking around with scratchy night vision, having fallen out of a helicopter, searching for my squad. Linear doesn't even describe the missions, if you so much as get too far ahead you'll get shit on, and even if our magical army rangers can regenerate and shrug off 7.62mm rounds you'll have a bitch of a time walking up a three foot incline.

     I haven't had a chance to try the multiplayer yet, and there is still another game mode that I understand is a wave based survival mode. Like all COD wannabes I'm sure the campaign was so damn short to accommodate a giant multiplayer section. I remember the days when multiplayer meant breaking out another controller and having a friend actually in the room with you, if you want us to spend more time on your game make the campaign worth playing.

     In conclusion I expected more from DICE and EA, like really guys why couldn't you put a little of that Battlefield know how into your projects, but hey it came with a shiny plastic case!


Pros

• Real world knowledge
• Linkin Park
• Exclusive content : Frontline
• Ammo sharing
• Some funny lines
• 50 cal bitches!
• Waited long enough for it to be $20

Cons

• Red Screen
• Too many characters
• Linear
• Cripple Marine
• Horrible learning curve
• Extras??
• Ammo Sharing
• No customization
• What an ending...