Max Payne (2008)

Coming together to solve a series of murders in New York City are a police detective whose family was slain as part of a conspiracy and an assassin out to avenge her sister's death. The duo will be hunted by the police, the mob, and a ruthless corporation.

Director:

John Moore

Writers:

Beau Thorne (screenplay), Sam Lake (video game by Remedy Entertainment and 3-D Realms Entertainment)

Stars:

Mark Wahlberg, Mila Kunis, Beau Bridges

1 nomination.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Mark Wahlberg	...	Max Payne
Mila Kunis	...	Mona Sax
Beau Bridges	...	BB Hensley
Ludacris	...	Jim Bravura (as Chris 'Ludacris' Bridges)
Chris O'Donnell	...	Jason Colvin
Donal Logue	...	Alex Balder
Amaury Nolasco	...	Jack Lupino
Kate Burton	...	Nicole Horne
Olga Kurylenko	...	Natasha
Rothaford Gray	...	Joe Salle
Joel Gordon	...	Owen Green
Jamie Hector	...	Lincoln Deneuf
Andrew Friedman	...	Trevor
Marianthi Evans	...	Michelle Payne
Nelly Furtado	...	Christa Balder

Storyline

Three years ago, NYPD detective Max Payne's wife and baby were murdered. Max gets himself transferred to the cold case office where he can continue searching for the killer who got away. He's a loner, but two people reach out to him during a fateful week: Alex, his ex-partner who may have found a clue, and BB, the security chief at the pharmaceutical company where Max's wife worked. Meanwhile, bodies are piling up, some as a result of a drug on the street that is highly addictive and, for many who take it, brings hideous hallucinations. When one of the bodies is a woman Payne was the last to see alive, her sister comes looking for him armed to the teeth; Max must move fast.

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Plot Keywords:

police detective | ex partner | death | hallucination | corporation | 

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Genres:

Action | Crime | Drama | Mystery | Thriller

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Certificate:

14A

Details

Official Sites:

Official site [Japan] Twentieth Century Fox [France]

Country:

Canada USA

Language:

English Russian Spanish

Release Date:

17 October 2008 (Canada)

Also Known As:

Max Payne

Filming Locations:

Hamilton, Ontario, Canada

Box Office

Budget:

$35,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend:

£1,004,995 (UK) (14 November 2008)

Gross:

$40,687,294 (USA) (9 January 2009)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Abandon Entertainment, Collision Entertainment, Depth Entertainment

Technical Specs

Runtime:

100 min 103 min (unrated)

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital DTS

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

This is the second video game adaptation Olga Kurylenko appears in, the other being Hitman. Coincidentally they both feature former Prison Break actors as antagonists.

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Goofs

When Gunnery Sergeant. Jack Lupino is shown on video during his interview, his Gunnery Sergeant lapel pins are pointing in the wrong direction. The top should be placed vertically, with the single point up and the center of the insignia on a line bisecting the angle of the collar's point. Also, he is referred to as "Sergeant", as a Marine he would be addressed as "Gunnery Sergeant".

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Quotes

[first lines]
Max Payne: I don't believe in heaven. I believe in pain. I believe in fear. I believe in death.

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Crazy Credits

Stay watching after the credits for an extra scene, in which Max is reunited with Mona at a bar to be shown further developments involving Aesir, implying both have more to do (setting the scene for a possible sequel).

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Connections

References The Public Enemy (1931)

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Soundtracks

Forgotten Toy
Written by Paul Stoney & Stephen French
Performed by Metsuo

User Reviews

strongly urging you NOT to see this film

"I don't believe in angels, but I believe in pain..." Those opening lines of the movie can only mean one thing, trite bull****. I don't know what the people over at Fox Studios were doing when the subject of making a movie out of one of the best shoot 'em up, film noir inspired, and heart racing video game franchises came up for discussion. It certainly wasn't "Hey, we should play the game to see what this thing is all about." Nope. It was more like "Hey! This game made a lot of money. Someone quickly tell me what the back of the box says about the game and we'll write a crappy screenplay around it and miscast the whole thing." Mark Wahlberg plays Max Payne, the brutal, no holds barred and out for revenge cop from the video game of the same name... but wait! They rewrote nearly the whole character. He couldn't seem to give a rats ass about his murdered wife and child except for a few bland flashbacks. The acting is so misplaced and frozen in this movie and adding the likes of Mila Kunis, Chris O'Donnell, Ludicrous (holy crap what were they thinking?), and Beau Bridges didn't really give them much of a leg to stand on.

To sum it all up, I felt like falling asleep during the film (a feat not so easily accomplished for me). This was an action movie turned into a long boring drama with a few shooting sequences.

Don't waste your money. Rent 'Shoot Em Up' instead