Shoot ’em up, is like forbidden candy

Owen and Giamatti facing each other with guns

Sometimes I like the high adrenaline fuelled action films that the film industry puts out. The last film like this I watched and loved was Crank, hence I'm also looking forward to seeing War at some point in the near future. I watched Smokin Aces recently and was let down by its highly ilogical plot and how it tried to take its self somewhat seriously. Shoot'em up like crank doesn't take its self seriously and delivers just 90mins of pure adrenaline rushing, mind numming, laugh out loud, entertainment. The only time it slows down is for sharp pieces of dialogue. Its just what I needed after a difficult weekend.

I'm not the only one who loved the film, check out this imdb review titled Perhaps the Most Shamelessly Ridiculous Film Ever Conceived.

Are you tired of all those heartless, senseless, generic and cliché, action-driven Hollywood films? That honor style and blood over character and plot? Well then I have news for you: don't go see “Shoot Em' Up”.

But it's a shame that you won't. The film whose trailer I pointed to and said 'that's what film-making has come to these days; all attitude and no heart', turns out to be the most fun and riotous satire I've seen in a long time. “Shoot Em' Up”–a relentless, simultaneously energizing and hilarious movie–is a surprisingly smart confection. As conceived by writer-director Mike Davis its an over-the-top send-up of every action film ever made; a wink and a nod (as well as a parody of) to the bloody overkill of “Die Hard” and “Rambo”, the gleeful excitement and charm of “Indiana Jones”, the cornball abandon of “James Bond”, the who cares of “North by Northwest”, the heroic terseness and ease of “Bourne”, the ultra-stylized and preposterous overdrive of “The Matrix” or anything ever made by John Woo (particularly a love for “Hard-Boiled”), and even in one scene the splendid lunacy of “Raising Arizona”.

The whole project, through controlled chaos and witty abandon, is made as a single, continuous in-joke. As in most films that take themselves too seriously, Clive Owen's hero (enigmatically titled Mr. Smith) quite literally never stops shooting. He shoots while having sex, he shoots while in the middle of free-fall, he shoots the umbilical cord off of a baby, he shoots with his fingers broken. Davis takes over-the-top to a whole new level; poking fun at action movies by taking their ridiculousness to its brinking point.

Yes the sex scene was perfectly delivered and unlike other films (except crank again) not pushed in for the sake of its self. I urge you to see this film in the highest defination you can get (cinema if possible) as there's no slow downs or clever camera tricks. Its just all the way out there action and before you know it the film will be over with a bang. Yes I won't be able to look at Carrots in the same way again.

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