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S.W.A.T. (Widescreen Special Edition)

S.W.A.T. (Widescreen Special Edition)

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Rating: 2 stars
Summary: bleh. . .
Review: Very disappointing. The plot is predictable, the acting uninspired, and some parts are absurdly unrealistic. It is enough to pass the time, but of the same genre, I would reccomend "The Negotiator" first.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: GREAT
Review: THE MOVIE WAS SOOO COOL.. IT COULDNT BE ANY BETTER! COLLEN FARELL WAS SO FREAKIN HOTT AND KICKED SOME MAJOR BUTT!!!!
i GIVE IT 5 STARS

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Average
Review: Remember the days when action movies were described as "Die Hard on a ______"? Remember how any movie that was described like that never seemed to live up to the name Die Hard? S.W.A.T. is kinda like that.

It's not good, nor is it bad. It just kind of...is. In actuality, some parts of the film are really quite good and just scream with potential to be a part of a better movie. The real failure of this movie is the action. Again, not that the action is bad, it just isn't good. Even the climactic set piece where the characters take down the main villian never rises above even the least impressive action scenes from Die Hard. In the end, what you feel like is you just watched a pretty good TV episode.

The saving grace of this film is the characters. Samuel L. Jackson, L.L. Cool Jay, Michelle Rodriquez, and even Colin Farrel bring enough charisma and chemistry to the characters to keep you interested. In fact, their likable enough that you'd probably be interested in seeing a sequel regardless of what you thought of this one.

But in the end, S.W.A.T. is just an average action movie that doesn't do anything really wrong but neither does it ever rise up to do anything really impressive. Catch it on video.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: 3.5 STARS to be exact
Review: Good action film, quite entertaining...yet wouldn't say its my favourite. Have no specific complaints...I'm just not as "involved" into movies like some are. I'm sorry, I won't get offended if a movie doesn't have a perfect dialogue and such. Regarding the movie itself, go for it!

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: OK, but no academy awards
Review: S.W.A.T. is an ok movie. Samuel L. Jackson, Colin Ferrell and the rest of the cast are extremely talented actors, and they all do a great job of rising above an average action script. There are some great lines, but at points the movie bogs down in exposition as the storyline is developed in excrutiating detail, at points almost too much detail as information is included that does nothing to move the film, such as a lot of stuff about the movie's main bad guy.

The biggest problem with the movie is editing. There are times, especially during the action scenes, that the scenes are worked together in such a manner that the film becomes hard to follow. The second biggest problem is predictability -- elements of the movie that are treated like they're supposed to be surprises are telegraphed to the audience way before they're ever revealed.

The film does include some interesting details, however. While the film may be based on the 70s TV show of the same name, it isn't an updated version of the TV show. That is, there's one scene where a TV set is on in the background running a scene from the original show, and in another scene the cast celebrate passing an important training exercise by humming the TV show theme over beers. So to the characters in this movie, S.W.A.T. the TV show actually was a TV show (although there are some cameos from the original cast members, playing LA's finest).

It's not the best movie ever made, but it's not the worst this summer. While it won't win any academy awards, it's still very much worthy of the price of admission.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: fast paced and fun to watch
Review: I have to admit I'm not old enough to have indulged in the TV show version of this movie, so I didn't have anything to compare it to. However, I think the movie did very well. Afterall, they pretty much already had a working script, since they didn't have to think of anything original. And director Clark Johnson seemed to have more fun with the action, than with anything else.

The main set up is that Jim Street (Colin Farrell) is a hot shot, tough guy hottie (like he is in pretty much all of his movies.) He's a S.W.A.T member and ends up getting reamed, along with his partner when his partner (Jeremy Renner) shoots a hostage as part of a stand off when he was told to wait. They get the bad guy, but wounded hostage doesn't sit well with his captain.

His partner ops to leave when they are taken off S.W.A.T. Basically, he's upset that Jim won't stand with him in giving the finger to the higher ups. He thinks Jim is sucking up and selling out.

After an argument, and a violent reaction by Jim's friend, in the locker room, Jim stays and does his time in the gun cage where he's demoted and Jeremy leaves.

Cut to 6 months later and Jim is still tooling away in the gun cage until Sam Jackson swaggers in with his coolness and cockness, and grudge against the captain, and puts together a very impressive team of S.W.A.T member, Jim being one of them.

The comraderie between the members is fun and funny to watch. Chris Sanchez (Michelle Rodriguez) is the only female, but her hard eye, growling snarl and tough stare makes her believable in playing with the guys and guns. The PG-13 romance that begins to bloom between Colin and Michelle is sweet, mainly because Colin has just the right blend of charm, over-confidence and sexiness to make it work. He's very comfortable with the ladies.

Our villian is Alex (Olivier Martinez), the French hottie from Unfaithful, and, as an arrested drug overlord, he has the city in a frenzy when he puts out the call that anyone bad enough to break him out will pocket 100 million dollars. He has gang members all over trying their hand and failing, but the S.W.A. T members try to stay a step ahead of the nutcases.

Okay, the plot is reaching, but there are several great action sequences that help the movie move along. There isn't much lagging in between scenes because the dialogue is funny, catchy, and the chemistry between the team members is so good. They all quickly become an extended family, look out for each other and end up being a force against the Police Captain who has a hard-on for them to fail.

Samuel and Colin play great off each other other, and L.L. Cool J and Michelle Rodriguez are added bonuses. If you're looking for flaws, you may find them, but over all, the action is fantastic, dialogue is funny; silly at times and Colin is eye candy.

I was actually surprised to see it rated PG-13, so you sure won't see any sex or cursing. Actually, there wasn't even any kissing. Mild flirting it is.

Still, this works if you like action and fun, and it was just long enough.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Predictable, but very fun
Review: This movie was your typical shoot 'em up blow 'em up. But it was a great shoot 'em up blow 'em up. Farrell was fantastic, as usual. Though some of his dialog wasn't the best Jackson was solid in his acting as ever. This was a fun movie.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Finally, a "TV movie" that was worth making
Review: Let me first say that this is the first movie since--was it "Unfaithful"?--to get me out of the house and into an actual movie theater. That says a lot right there. Now let me say that my wife is a cop and so are some of my friends. I'm ex-military and I have some weapons training, so I went into this movie expecting to be underwhelmed (and not a little upset) by the weapons handling. But I have to say, I was most impressed. Safe handling abounded, and the only careless act I saw was LL Cool J with his finger casually on the trigger of his shotgun at the wrong time. That's pretty impressive, and it's likely because real LAPD vets like Steve Gomez (the guy in shorts at the North Hollywood gig) and Scott Reitz (trainer extraordinaire) did the training. So on top of everything else, "S.W.A.T." has that going for it.

As far as the movie itself goes, it's serviceable--and amazingly restrained. I can imagine what kind of explosion-fest it would have been had Rob Cohen or Michael Bay directed it, and I'm glad they didn't. The plot is nothing new, but it's fairly solid. The story centers more around the team and its training, and less on the "get the bad guy" aspect, which was fine with me. Refreshing, even. I was a huge fan of the TV series back in the day, but I didn't expect any more connection to the series than the concept and the names. So of course the cameos by Steve Forrest and Rod Perry were a nice surprise.

The cast is good, good-looking, and comfortable in their roles. There's plenty here for everyone: action for the guys; hot guys for the girls. I thought I'd be tired of Colin Farrell by now, but surprisingly I'm not. His banter with Samuel L. Jackson was natural and convincing. And who can get enough of Michelle Rodgiguez kicking butt as usual? "S.W.A.T." is the popcorn movie of the summer...fall...and beyond. Can I reserve the DVD yet?

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: SWAT
Review: If you like an Action Adventure flick, you should enjoy this one. It's all about a hand picked Swat team in action and there isn't a dull moment from beginning to end. Samuel L. Jackson seemed a perfect fit for the roll of the seasoned Swat team leader and there was never any doubt as to who was calling the shots.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Low-stress summer fun
Review: If you're the kind of person who hates movies where the plot is relatively obvious, the quips are somewhat jaded and the acting takes second place to special effects and action sequences, I have some advice for you - DON'T GO SEE THIS MOVIE.

This movie is aimed at the mass-market, easy entertainment crowd where the eye candy is more important than the plot. I liked it for what it was - 2 hours or so of no-brainer fun.


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