William Hurt Movie:

		List Price: $38.96		Label: Sony Pictures Salesrank: 9491 Released: July 1, 2008
		Our Price: $7.99
		Used Price: $5.48
		MPAA Rating: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested) Media: Blu-ray

Editorial Review:
During an historic counter-terrorism summit in Spain, the President of the United States is struck down by an assassin's bullet. Eight strangers have a perfect view of the kill, but what did they really see? As the minutes leading up to the fatal shot are replayed through the eyes of each eyewitness, the reality of the assassination takes shape. But just when you think you know the answer, the shattering final truth is revealed. Vantage Point is a mind bending political action-thriller starring Dennis Quaid, Matthew Fox, Academy Award® Winner Forest Whitaker (Best Actor 2006, The Last King of Scotland), with Sigourney Weaver and Academy Award® winner William Hurt (Best Actor 1985, Kiss of the Spider Woman).

Description of Vantage Point (+ BD Live) [Blu-ray]:
Vantage Point, which aspires to be a cunningly twisted thriller, comes equipped with plenty of hurtling action, handheld camerawork, what-was-that? editing, and a plot that has multiple, contradictory agendas writhing like a nest of snakes. It's all set a-boil within a few blocks of a town square in Spain where a U.S. President is targeted for assassination. Although the movie lasts 90 minutes, the events it depicts are mostly over with in a quarter-hour or so--but seen, rewound, and reseen from half a dozen different (you guessed it) vantage points. The first line in the credits reads "Original Film," apparently the name of the production company. "Gimmick Movie" would be more accurate; the opening reel, effectively jolting, affords an initial overview of the events through the eyes, lenses, monitors, and dueling sensibilities of a TV news producer (Sigourney Weaver), her activist-minded reporter (Zoe Saldana) and crew. Everybody’s in Salamanca (actually, Mexico City) for the start of an international conference to reaffirm Arab-Western commitment to the fight against terrorism. Terrorism, of course, sees this as an ideal moment to break out. As gunshots and explosions reduce everything to chaos, the clock is reset to zero and we proceed to revisit the scene as experienced by several Secret Service agents (namely Dennis Quaid and Matthew Fox), an American tourist with camcorder (Forest Whitaker), sundry locals--including three who may be caught up in a love triangle or a conspiracy or both--and even the President himself (William Hurt).

For a while, this is mildly diverting: that guy, or that gesture, so sinister when glimpsed across the plaza in one run-through, now appears harmless in close-up--or vice versa. But there's no real ambiguity (so stop with the careless comparisons to Kurosawa's Rashomon)--this is a shell game in which the peas aren't worth tracking. Despite decent actors, the characters might as well be holograms (although poor Forest Whitaker is saddled with "motivation" of surpassing sappiness), and the casting telegraphs several twists: one redoubtable good guy practically gives a wink-wink, nudge-nudge that he's really bad, etc. The movie declines to specify which nutjob philosophy the terrorists espouse, and their numbers are multi-ethnic. There's also a laborious suggestion that they have bloodthirsty, reactionary counterparts among the President's inner circle, which perhaps qualifies as redeeming socio-political comment and prompts a meaningless declaration of deep meaning from the Prez. The whole megilleh finally comes down to an extended car chase through impassably claustrophobic streets that would mark a lurch into unintentional self-parody--if only that point hadn't been passed a couple of rewinds earlier. --Richard T. Jameson

Stills from Vantage Point (click for larger image)

Vantage Point (+ BD Live) [Blu-ray] Reviews:
What's happening now!
2009-12-29 - Great movie! Dennis Quaid is super. This movie shows how many people see different things from their vantage point. It also gives you an inside look as to how terrorists or any terror group works to get their job done, even to die to get their job done. Although this is fiction, there are many possiblities that could be true. The movie gives you something to think about and to be alert and aware of your surroundings.

Vantage Point
2009-12-15 - This is the second time I have purchased this DVD from Amazon, and we still cannot play it. We have had no problems with any other movies/DVD's...only this one. It is a puzzle to us. We will have to (again) return it. The first time, it was from another seller through Amazon, and we assumed that returning that one and receiving a different one through Amazon would be better. Not so. We are now wondering how many others have had problems with this particular movie????

Dreadful
2009-11-05 - I felt as though I were passing through a torture chamber, not once, but eight times.
The whole movie is based on chaos. If all the spectacles were stripped from this movie, it
would not have any substance. Driving through the most unattractive areas of Phoenix would
have been better than watching this movie. The JFK assassination, on which this movie was based,
was an interesting documentary, because it allows the viewer to determine the facts from various
evidence. The writer could not even do this successfully. I watch movies to gain a wonderful feeling
at the end, to see some sort of challenge, or achievement, or heroics. This movie had none of those
simple ideas. Why pay for chaos when you can buy a newspaper.

Requires a huge leap of faith
2009-10-24 - This movie started out pretty interesting, but it degenerates into utter nonsense. I like to suspend logic and enjoy a movie, but when it gets to the silly level, I lose interest. There are a few things here that just kill this movie.

1. The movie portrays the Secret Service as a bunch of poorly trained buffoons. I know for a fact that this is nonsense. These guys are highly trained specialists. A lot of them are ex-military. There is no way that one guy could take out over a dozen of them like portrayed in the film. No way.
2. The worlds dumbest kid stops dead in front of a speeding ambulance and the terrorist driver swerves out of the way to avoid killing her. Since when do terrorists worry about killing kids?
3. One of the terrorists has a cell phone with technology from the 31st century. He can detonate bombs, activate machine guns, and shave in the morning with this thing. The only thing missing from it was a transporter from Star Trek.
4. If kidnapping the President of the United States was that easy, G.W. Bush would have been taken out 6 years ago. Utter nonsense.
5. The longest car chase since Gone in 60 Seconds, was just a boring waste of time.

I just could not get past these plot failures enough to enjoy the movie. To me, it was about as realistic as Pirates of the Carribean.


100 GREATEST MOVIES YOU HAVE NEVER SEEN BY HARD TO FIND MUSIC AND MOVIES
2009-10-09 - this movie made my 100 greatest movies you have never seen list as posted on [...]. great acting, great action, great story. so do you need more?