Max friggin' Payne (2008)

I didn't even know the movie was coming out this year till I chanced upon the trailer on YouTube. Being the uber-geek that I am, anything involving cool action and computer games and special effects just does it for me. Anyway, the movie is based on the awesome game that allowed players to use 'bullet time' for just about anything (although it takes a while to recharge). I heard from a LOT of people that the movie sucks ass, probably because it's more of a 'loosely-based' version rather than a direct adaptation. Now, I've only played bits of the game, so that's probably why I didn't hate it so much.

*spoilers*

Our hero is a cop. His wife and kid gets slaughtered one day, and so he's currently in the Cold Case department, trying to find any link that could lead to the killer. While investigating, this Russian chick gets murdered, and with Max's wallet (and ID) found beside her, he's on the run from the cops, while trying to find out who framed him.

As the movie progresses, Max finds out that there is a super-drug hawked on the streets, called Valkyr, which, when consumed, causes the taker to see tons of flying demons and stuffs called Valkyries.

[Now, I always thought that Valkyries were fat Viking ladies sitting on tiny horses that could fly.]

So anyway, after a murder attempt by his best friend BB (who, as it turns out, was the one who dealt the final blow on his wife), Max takes the drug to prevent hypothermia, since he just climbed out of freezing water.

[Cue cool special effects and flying things reminiscent of Constantine.]

He goes on a rampage, and finally corners BB (up on the HELIPAD!!) and kills him. Then the SWAT team comes and arrests him.

Yes. That is how the movie ends.

I couldn't help but grin when they showed the scene with the helipad, since the game ends with Max M16-ing (well, that's how I did it) the antenna tower so that it falls onto the helicopter (which was MIA in this movie. Well, there WAS one, but not the one I'm referring to).

And ALL of the bits that I played (the kitchen fire scene, the mansion scene, the muffin' ELEVATOR-LASER SCENE, and the ENDING!!!), were not in the friggin' movie.

Visually, I thought the movie was great. I liked the flying things, especially this scene where the drug made this junkie feel like he was being pulled out of the literal hole-in-the-wall by a winged demon, when actually, it wasn't.

Ryan was right, though. They only had ONE bullet-time scene (for a movie adaptation of a game requiring skills on diving-sideways-and-shooting-at-baddies), which they did WRONG ('cuz no diving hahaha), but I still thought it looked cool.

Being an expert at missing after-credits scenes, I'm gonna go see it again when I go back.

Like the fan-girl that I am, I got totally excited when I saw the trailer for Watchmen, even though I've seen the damned thing a million times already (the trailer, not the movie). Trailer doesn't promise much, but the comic was AWESOME! (Graphic novel, schmaphic novel. Still comics to me.)

March 6th is so far away... Can't wait!!