A covert counter-terrorist unit called Black Cell led by Gabriel Shear wants the money to help finance their war against international terrorism, but it's all locked away. Gabriel brings in convicted hacker Stanley Jobson to help him.
When the daughter of a well-known and well-respected base commander is murdered, an undercover detective is summoned to look into the matter and finds a slew of cover-ups at West Point.
Director:
Simon West
Stars:
John Travolta,
Madeleine Stowe,
James Cromwell
In order to foil an extortion plot, an FBI agent undergoes a facial transplant surgery and assumes the identity and physical appearance of a terrorist, but the plan turns from bad to worse when the same terrorist impersonates the FBI agent.
A DEA agent investigates the disappearance of a legendary Army ranger drill sergeant and several of his cadets during a training exercise gone severely awry.
Director:
John McTiernan
Stars:
John Travolta,
Samuel L. Jackson,
Connie Nielsen
When the DEA shut down its dummy corporation operation codenamed SWORDFISH in 1986, they had generated $400 million which they let sit around; fifteen years of compound interest has swelled it to $9.5 billion. A covert counter-terrorist unit called Black Cell, headed by the duplicitious and suave Gabriel Shear, wants the money to help finance their raise-the-stakes vengeance war against international terrorism, but it's all locked away behind super-encryption. He brings in convicted hacker Stanley Jobson, who only wants to see his daughter Holly again but can't afford the legal fees, to slice into the government mainframes and get the money. Written by
Jeff Cross <blackjac_1998@yahoo.com>
When the FBI agents are watching Gabriel and Stanley, one of them looks through the viewfinder of a camera (Canon XL1s) with a large lens. It is clearly visible that the viewfinder cable is not connected with the body of the camera. See more »
Quotes
[first lines]
Gabriel:
You know what the problem with Hollywood is? They make shit. Unbelievable, unremarkable shit. Now I'm not some grungy wannabe filmmaker that's searching for existentialism through a haze of bong smoke or something. No, it's easy to pick apart bad acting, short-sighted directing, and a purely moronic stringing together of words that many of the studios term as "prose". No, I'm talking about the lack of realism. Realism; not a pervasive element in today's modern American cinematic ...
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Crazy Credits
The opening studio logos for Warner Bros and Village Roadshow Productions flicker as if they were on a problematic computer screen. Other than those logos and the movie's title, there are no opening credits. See more »
This movie can be summed up as: lots of very cool action scenes (fans of both bullet time and explosions will really enjoy this), a lot of style, and a standard implausible plot. This movie is very entertaining if you like non-stop action in a cool high-tech environment.
The ingredients are pretty standard. There's a stylish kick-ass villain (Travolta) with a plan, being a high-tech bank robbery. This is all garnished with lots of weapons, technology, car chases and beautiful women. This movie really delivers on the action front, I don't think there's any 'quiet' scene that lasts more than 2 minutes. It also contains the now standard implausible hacking scenes, where getting into the computer system of a bank involves solving a kind of Rubik's cube on your computer screen. I hope you're not offended by product placement because a certain computer brand is quite prominent when IT hardware is involved in this movie. But it's by far not as obnoxious as in "I, Robot".
The filming is top-notch, unlike some other movies you can actually see what's happening in the action scenes (which is sometimes due to the amazing slow-down effects in some scenes). Unfortunately the entire plot becomes quite thin when the movie is stripped of all this action and style. However, it works. The ending is rather vague, as if room was left for a sequel without making it too painful if there wouldn't be one after all.
Overall I would say this is a pretty OK movie, but don't expect the best cinema ever.
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This movie can be summed up as: lots of very cool action scenes (fans of both bullet time and explosions will really enjoy this), a lot of style, and a standard implausible plot. This movie is very entertaining if you like non-stop action in a cool high-tech environment.
The ingredients are pretty standard. There's a stylish kick-ass villain (Travolta) with a plan, being a high-tech bank robbery. This is all garnished with lots of weapons, technology, car chases and beautiful women. This movie really delivers on the action front, I don't think there's any 'quiet' scene that lasts more than 2 minutes. It also contains the now standard implausible hacking scenes, where getting into the computer system of a bank involves solving a kind of Rubik's cube on your computer screen. I hope you're not offended by product placement because a certain computer brand is quite prominent when IT hardware is involved in this movie. But it's by far not as obnoxious as in "I, Robot".
The filming is top-notch, unlike some other movies you can actually see what's happening in the action scenes (which is sometimes due to the amazing slow-down effects in some scenes). Unfortunately the entire plot becomes quite thin when the movie is stripped of all this action and style. However, it works. The ending is rather vague, as if room was left for a sequel without making it too painful if there wouldn't be one after all.
Overall I would say this is a pretty OK movie, but don't expect the best cinema ever.