Movie review: Vantage Point

by Alex Bentley

Vantage Point is the classic example of a film that doesn’t know when to say when, not so much for its running time, as it clocks in at a scant 90 minutes, but for the sheer number of characters that it tries to involve in its intricate plot. Supposedly told in Rashomon style, Point tries to give the audience a feel for a crime from every conceivable perspective, but in the end, it overreaches its bounds.

The central event of Point is the apparent assassination of President Ashton (William Hurt) while attending an anti-terrorism conference in Spain (ooh, terrorism at an anti-terrorism conference – how cutting edge!). The first perspective we see of the shooting is the “official” one – TV coverage of the conference, led randomly by Sigourney Weaver. Of course, despite having 10 or so cameras in and around the plaza where the conference takes place, they are focused in the wrong direction to be of any real help in determining the true course of events.

Every 10-15 minutes or so, the film rewinds to show a different vantage point (hence the name). Among the different angles are: tourist Howard Lewis (Forest Whitaker); Secret Service Agent Thomas Barnes (Dennis Quaid), who, conveniently enough, has just come back to active duty after previously preventing another assassination attempt; the president himself; and what might be one of the people plotting the crime.

These different perspectives all supposedly advance the plot to the point where the true perpetrators of the crime are revealed. But writer Barry Levy forgot one major thing – it’s one thing to play “gotcha” and pull the rug out from under the audience when making “surprise” revelations. It’s another to just do so without assigning any kind of import to why the perpetrators did what they did. Levy attempts to throw in way too many little twists that end up muddling the plot unnecessarily. Bad guys become good guys and vice versa so often that the film ties itself into knots trying to keep everything straight.

Point also never intrigues enough with the whodunit portion of the film. Part of the fun of whodunits is trying to figure out, well, whodunit, and Point never actively encourages that by dropping clues, subtle or not. Rather, it just teases us with precious tidbits of information leading up to the big revelation, never giving the opportunity for the audience to care much about the secrets of the film. It also never lives up to its Rashomon billing, as there are never really conflicting accounts of what happened – the audience is just given a little more information every time the events are replayed.

But Point redeems itself somewhat toward the end with a breakneck car chase that, even though the stakes are pretty silly, still manages to put you on the edge of your seat. It’s hard to tell if it’s just a lesson in great editing or if the car chase was actually thrilling to shoot as well, but either way, it creates a decent amount of buzz when the film needs it most. However, in keeping with the theme of the rest of Point, the ending to the chase hinges on a patently ludicrous situation, dampening much of the momentum it had built up in the first place.

Vantage Point’s premise gave it the possibility to be an interesting film, but the overall inanity of the script and the lack of any kind of real payoff make it just a middle-of-the-road kind of film.

• Staff
• Verified User
• Anonymous