Jeanskynebu the audience applauded

BootDigest Such a frustrating disappointment

SpunkySelfTwitter It’s an especially fun movie from a director and cast who are clearly having a good time allowing themselves to let loose.

StyleSk8r At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

ratimir2 The situation: A Machine from space, buried somewhere under Poland since the ice age, has been unearthed and is spewing out hordes of "mutants" (distinguishable from standard Hollywood zombies primarily by their giant claw). Despite their last attempt being foiled by the advanced technology of the neolithic era, the mutants are able to drive 28th century humanity to the brink of destruction in under two months.The obvious solution is the Ripley Gambit: "I say we take off and nuke the entire site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure."The alternative obvious solution is for the combined militaries of the four megacorporations that rule earth to converge on the Machine and wipe out the mutants.The significantly less obvious solution is this:Gather a single squad of soldiers, mixing troops from all the megacorps, who have more experience fighting against each other than together. Airlift them to Canaan. Send them into the tunnels that they can use to sneak into the Machine in nearby Poland (and wasn't it nice of the mutants to stay behind the seal when there was apparently a back door?). Once there, they will put back the Device which was taken from the Machine (for no apparent reason) ten thousand years ago. We THINK the Device is some kind of bomb, but we don't actually know. We do, however, know that it requires a separate Trigger, which the team will also carry. And a separate Key. Which we DO NOT HAVE, but will blindly assume that the squad will be able to find somewhere in the Machine. For some reason. The squad will detonate the Device, destroying the Machine and saving humanity. Should anything go wrong with this flawless plan, we will have absolutely zero alternatives, contingencies or backups. If this plan fails, "every man, woman and child on this planet will die".Guess which solution this film goes with. The others aren't even discussed. No others are.That a fictional character thinks this is a good plan is ridiculous writing. That a dozen other fictional characters, some of them experienced soldiers and officers, agree to it is ludicrous writing. That is works almost perfectly takes us all the way into the plaid zone.And it's far from the stupidest thing in this story. I think that award goes to the rescue of an officer who was captured within spitting distance of the seal just after it was broken. The team finds him in the tunnels being dragged towards the machine to be turned into a mutant. SIX WEEKS LATER. The mutant has presumably dragged him on the scenic route, via Bulgaria. And kept him adequately fed and hydrated. Which is nice of him.The inane plot is probably the weakest point of the film, but not by far. Between the dialogue and the acting (and I KNOW several of these actors are capable of much better performances than this) the characters universally lack character. The CGI varies wildly, sometimes flawless, sometimes laughable.On to the faint praise: The action scenes aren't generally awful. Or memorable. Monster makeup and effects are fine, shame the design is so unimaginative.As an adaptation of the Mutant Chronicles games: It isn't. From the fine details (the 6th letter of Capitol) to the broadest generalisation (the entire concept of the Dark Legion), there is nothing here but a few names: MC, the four megacorps (no Cybertronic), a few characters. And these are all "In Name Only". As a random glaring example: Valerie Duval, Asian Mishiman single mother.There are a few films which stand out as examples of how not to make an adaptation. Catwoman. Fant4stic. Judge Dredd. Uwe Boll. The Last Airbender. They fail on the counts of both making a good film and of making a faithful adaptation.Mutant Chronicles is worse than most of them on the first count and worse than any of them on the second.

mats-filipsson Anyone that knows about the Mutant Chronicles...will laugh at this, there is no explanation to why earth looks like it does, with steam machines etc, its because in the past mankind dug up a black stone on Pluto, from this stone the brotherhood felt that it is emitting some strange force, this force is later called "Dark symmetry" which made all technological things on earth go haywire, so mankind had to destroy anything with high tech in it, since its being controlled by some unseen force "Algeroth the machine father" Mishima, Cybertronic, Bauhaus, Capitol and Imperial, the 5 great forces of planet earth, why are there no cybertronic characters in this movie? The universe of "Doomtrooper" is so big, so much things to see, the cool brotherhood assassins "Mortificators" where are they? I could have done twice as good of a movie with half that budget. They hoist the wrong flag at the start of the movie to boot...imperial but they are capitol.

Quebec_Dragon Sometimes, seemingly simple movies, panned by most of the critics, just grab me. This was one of them. It takes place in the future, but I was gripped from the get-go with World War II trench-like warfare going on at the start. It feels very much like a good war movie at this point with a compassionate officer going up against some kind of Nazis, but things are not really that especially with the steampunk machines and unconventional firearms. It goes even crazier when some long-dormant evil is awakened. After that strong opening, we delve summarily into that society and some kind of prophecy that involves a desperate quest to save the world by a small group of heroes. It sounds pretty cliché, right, but weirdly it works here and the characters are compelling despite not being characterized much. It's the type of suicide mission story where the "heroes" get killed of one by one, and not always in the most heroic manner. However, you kinda grow attached to the multi-ethnic group, want to learn more about them (some intriguing snippets but not much) and their sometimes noble self-sacrificial acts make them likable. I truly enjoyed the heroism on display, but can't say I was particularly emotionally moved by any of the deaths. I also liked very much how the plot sometimes played with our expectations (witness the mother and child trying to evacuate) despite some logical flaws that bugged me a little.The mutants in question are not super-heroes (like X-Men) or standard "zombies", and the title is misleading because it's not really "their" chronicles. Thee mutants are antagonists and besides attacking and being killed, they don't do much. The movie is apparently low-budget (at 25 millions, I'd say medium-budget) but it really doesn't show. You have stunning special effects, decors and vehicles that don't really look computer-generated (and sometimes actually weren't). It's not to say everything is realistic, it's a bit stylized and otherwordly like 300 for example. There were some really spectacular scenes and vistas. The action scenes were exciting and overall I thought the directing was very good. The movie was paced well, and I was never bored. One thing I didn't really care much for was the religious claptrap, but I've seen worse.Please note however that I didn't watch the shorter (by around 10 minutes) director's cut that cuts some of the religious stuff but also a few nice character moments. I did check the differences and suggest watching the theatrical non director's cut version if you can. Before I forget, you do have some bad-ass heroes kicking major butt in satisfying ways (less and less guns and more sword fighting as it goes), and some enjoyable b-movie one-liners by Thomas Jane's character. So it's certainly not the type of movie you haven't seen before, but it's masterfully executed, beautiful in a post-apocalyptic way, but most of all it feels right. A rental is definitely recommended and myself, I'm even thinking of buying it.Rating: 8 out of 10 (Very good).

Gustavo Alvarado Why did I pick this up from the video club shelf? Because I red "John Malkovich" on its DVD cover. Wrong reason.This is just another pointless journey to save the world, in this case, one that takes place on a Steam Machine based 28th century at (attrition) war... and there are mutants and a mysterious machine. Do I need to say more?Forget the plot, there isn't any. On the image, this one comes from the same hole Sin City did, flaunting an almost abusive use of chroma-key and hours of rendering frames. When I focused my attention to its artistic approach, Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow was the film to compare with and, as expected, the results didn't help the whole picture either.I had already seen, and actually enjoyed, this movie before: The Chronicles of Riddick. Same character, same mutation, same inconsistencies, but – hey! – Vin Diesel entertains, and is exactly there where this one falls on disgrace. Those more than 100 minutes (the maximum of running time an adventure flick should last) take us to a boring trip where only one relevant turning point occurs, only one and I might be too generous.But lets be honest, the major disappointment out of this failure was John Malkovich. He did gave life to his scenes and I actually filled myself with expectations when he first appeared, but then... his screen time... what the hell was that? It would've been a traumatic premature ejaculation if we were talking about sex. So much to give, but not time at all.Mutant Chronicles: a very bad movie. I should have paid attention to its title instead.