Reviewed by: Swank
Director: Mathieu Kassovitz
Actors:
Vin Diesel
Michelle Yeoh
Gerard Depardieu

Movie: 2 stars
DVD: 1/2 a star
Overall: 2 stars

Toorop (Vin Diesel) is hired to smuggle a young girl into the United States against the backdrop of a distant, dystopian future.

It’s been a while since I had a good laugh at a science-fiction/action film, and that’s why I’m truly grateful to have been given the opportunity—nee the privilege—to review Babylon A.D.

This is the sort of film that hearkens back to sci-fi-actioneers like Christopher Lambert’s Fortress or Escape From New York. Yeah, they’re cheesy, but they’re fun and pretty to look at. It’s the sort of movie you want to watch with some friends over a beer so you can have a good laugh.

This film has a three beer minimum.

I laughed especially hard at the part where Diesel and his young and delightfully attractive ward (along with her chaperone, a completely underused Michelle Yeoh) are refugees on a submarine bound for Canada. There’s a shot of the young girl falling asleep in the cargo hold and the film makes a hard cut to them in bad ass military style snowsuits, cruising the Yukon with futuristic snowmobiles with no explanation whatsoever. The disparate nonsense of the action and the cutting was so thoroughly enjoyable I was actually taken off guard.  Some movies drill your head with ideas, this movie did that, minus the ideas.

I’m truly glad that Vin Diesel makes movies like this, because they will always make for great bad movie nights.  The only downside to this movie for a bad movie night is the disappointing lack of boobs.

Video: 2.35:1 Anamorphic Widescreen – The film looked like any other DVD, nothing seemed especially awesome about the transfer.

Audio: English 5.1 Dolby Digital, French Dolby Surround. Subtitles in English, Spanish and French.

The Single Disc version features both the theatrical version (90 minutes) and the extended version (101 minutes).

The special features on the disc were lazily absent. I thought it was a typo on the back of cover when it said in bold letters “Special Feature” instead of “Special Features” with an “s”.

The only other extra features to speak of on the disc are:

Trailers: The Rocker, Joy Ride 2 and X-Files: I Want To Believe.

Behind the Scenes Look: Behind Enemy Lines: Colombia: There’s seriously a behind the scenes look at the straight to video sequel to Behind Enemy Lines hosted by WWE “Superstar” Mr. Kennedy. I watched it and now I wish I could unwatch it.

At the point where there were no special features to speak of and the film is worth watching inebriated with friends ready to laugh this is probably one to leave for a rental night. Unless you really love action movies and are the biggest XXX fan in the world. In which case, I’d advise the double disc version or the Blu-ray.

Extra Tidbit: Mathieu Kassovitz developed the film adaptation for five years. I think he should have let it gestate longer.