CIA (Central Intelligence Agency)

Starring:Cia
Studio: Bfs Entertainment
Product Type: DVD

Average customer rating:

Watch and worry, about America's state secrets
Exciting and entertaining
Intelligent Dialog
Very Well Made
I appreacited the way the movie doesn't provide a pat answer about Hanssen's motivations

Breach (Widescreen Edition)
Starring: Chris Cooper , Ryan Phillippe , Laura Linney , Dennis Haysbert , and Gary Cole
Director: Billy Ray
Manufacturer: Universal Studios
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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ASIN: B000OYAT3U
Release Date: 2007-06-12

Customer Reviews:

Watch and worry, about America's state secrets.......2007-07-07

This movie was a great treat, as it was a very entertaining two hours. The movie focuses on Robert Hansen, the turncoat who had did the greatest damage to the US's intelligence operations. In watching the movie, while keeping in mind it is based on actual events, you quickly have to wonder to what extent our nation's security rests on individuals like Hansen. The movie was great in grasping your attention by highlighting the fragility of our nation's intelligence apparatus. The movie also did a great job of allowing the watcher to get a sense of the isolation that is felt by those involved in protecting our nation. All in all, it was as entertaining as it was thought provoking. It is something you should surely see!!!!

Exciting and entertaining.......2007-07-04

We rented this movie just to have something to watch over the weekend. It was fantastic. We loved it so much that we watched it again the next day and then went out and bought a copy. Chris Cooper is phenomenal. I highly recommend it.

Intelligent Dialog.......2007-07-03

This movie is an excellent charecter study of two men: the spy and the clerk who help bring him down. The dialogs are intelligent. The whole sting operation to catch Hanssen is good. All the performances are top notch. Cooper potrayed Hanssen very well. Not much real action happens during the movie. The suspense is whether spy Hanssen will figure out the sting before they can catch him in the act.

The movie does not give easy answers to the motivation of Hanssen, which is very good. The man has complexes on top of his complexes. O'Neill's motivations are complex as well. He wants to protect his wife, serve his country, but he has some respect for Hanssen as well. Hanssen has many dark sides, but his wife and his grand kids love him. Hanssen is honestly concerned about O'Neill career and marriage.

I have one small problem. They keep talking about all the technology they are using to catch Hanssen and really, they did not use it to catch him. However, they don't show any whiz bang stuff in the movie. I mean one episode of CSI has more technology exhibited. This is a very small point. Somebody mentions Hanssen mumbles a lot, which thwarts their use of all their monitoring equipment set up in the office.

The movie is thoughtful look into the world of spies. It is very reminscent of the "The Falcon and the Snowman." and is on that level.

Very Well Made.......2007-07-03

While this may not have the glamour of a Bond-esque spy adventure, this will certainly be regarded as an important and possibly classic spy movie. While I wont go into detail about the story line, which is easily found on the back of the cover, I will say it was paced perfectly and didnt drag on with filler and useless B.S. It is true that you kind of know what happens even before you put in the DVD, however the fun with this movie is watching to see how we get there. I gave this only 4 stars simply because I dont regard it as a "perfect" movie, and for the $20 price tag. I rented this for a buck at redbox and although I liked it, it wasnt enough to compell me to "have" to own it.

I appreacited the way the movie doesn't provide a pat answer about Hanssen's motivations.......2007-07-02

While all movies based on historical subjects must fictionalize events and compress timelines, it is how they do so that matters. Do they still tell the underlying truth of the story? Do they distort the substance of the story? Do they dumb it down so much that it transforms the story into something else? If it does any of these things, I tend to dislike it to the extent it does so. While this movie does make up scenes that never happened and puts actions into the hands of people that didn't do them, it still tells the truth of the story quite well for a Hollywood movie. You can read about the reality and the movie at chasingthefrog under their reelfaces link for this movie. It is quite interesting.

The movie is told through the eyes of the FBI operative who was put close to Hanssen and who was very important during the last two months of the investigation that finally caught him. This person is quite real and his name is Eric O'Neill and is played very well by Ryan Phillippe. The focus of the movie is the spy and traitor Robert Hanssen. The performance given here by Chris Cooper is superb and I hope it is recognized when awards are handed out. Chris Cooper is a fantastic actor whose range of characterizations in his many performances is breathtaking. Not only in the type of character, but their ages, in how they look, their intelligence, their moral make-up. He has it all and I enjoy everything I have seen him do.

Hannsen's wife, Bonnie is played very well by Kathleen Quinlan, and it is her devout faith that adds such a contradiction to Hannsen's character and motivation. It would be easy to paint Hannsen as using his religion cynically. However, while he certainly violated the tenets of his faith, it is clear that he holds his faith close, even while engaging in many seriously bad and compromised behaviors (beyond the spying). O'Neill's immediate superior and FBI handler Kate Burroughs and played very well by Laura Linney. She is tough enough to use O'Neill unsympathetically and yet has enough sense to know when she is pushing too hard and when to take a different tact with her inside guy.

I enjoyed this movie very much. It is smart and doesn't cheat by giving us a simple answer to the puzzle. Just as in real life, we do not know Hanssen's true motivations. Even Hanssen may not understand them. We do know he cost real people their lives and compromised the United States in profound ways. He is justly spending 23 hours per day in solitary confinement.

Average customer rating:

I want the last 2 1/2 hours of my life back!
good shepard, BAD movie
CIA spies
C.I.A. Confused I Am
Boring as Heck !!!!!!

The Good Shepherd (Widescreen Edition)
Starring: Alec Baldwin , Matt Damon , Robert De Niro , Keir Dullea , and Michael Gambon
Manufacturer: Universal Studios
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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ASIN: B000MXPE7O
Release Date: 2007-04-03

Amazon.com

A complicated movie about the Central Intelligence Agency and its agents, The Good Shepherd isn't your typical spy movie. Though it stars Matt Damon (The Bourne Identity films) and Angelina Jolie (Mr. & Mrs. Smith, Lara Croft franchise)--actors with considerable experience in the action-espionage genre--The Good Shepherd requires that they play more subdued and (much less interesting) characters here. The movie focuses on the career or Edward Wilson (Damon), a privileged Yale graduate who goes on to help found the CIA. He is a quiet, serious, and guarded man, even in the most intimate moments with his civilian wife (Jolie, in a role that wastes her talent). Set against a backdrop of real-life events such as the Bay of Pigs, The Good Shepherd is meticulous in creating a realistic timeframe. The film gets a jolt of excitement when Robert DeNiro (in his first directing role since 1993's A Bronx Tale) peppers the screen with appearances by Joe Pesci, Alec Baldwin, and William Hurt. But those moments are too infrequent. At 157 minutes long, the film is crammed with many factual details, but the characters are shortchanged when it comes to development. Viewers have to wonder why anyone, much less someone like Wilson who has everything going for him, would devote his life to a thankless job that brings so little happiness to himself and his family. The Good Shepherd is an ambitious but flawed film. The actors do a formidable job with a well-intentioned but meandering script. However, we meet so many characters and learn so little about each that it's difficult to drum up much empathy for any of them. --Jae-Ha Kim

Description

Matt Damon, Angelina Jolie and Robert De Niro star in this powerful thriller about the birth of the CIA. Edward Wilson (Damon) believes in America, and will sacrifice everything he loves to protect it. But as one of the covert founders of the CIA, Edward's youthful idealism is slowly eroded by his growing suspicion of the people around him. Everybody has secrets…but will Edward's destroy him? With an all-star cast including Alec Baldwin, Billy Crudup, William Hurt, Timothy Hutton and John Turturro, it's the gripping story David Ansen of Newsweek hails as "spellbinding."

Customer Reviews:

I want the last 2 1/2 hours of my life back!.......2007-07-08

I bought this movie with the erroneous belief that I would be entertained. Now all I can think about is I want Robert DeNiro to some how compensate me for the last two and a half unbearably boring hours of my life! This movie is slow, boring, depressing, and doesn't even have a pay off at the end - which is a long time coming. I love spy movies. I love historical movies. I don't think that telling an historically inaccurate movie about the beginning of the CIA, hello SPY CENTRAL, should be without some spy intrigue. Oh, I am sorry; there was maybe 5 minutes of that type of scene. I don't think it is enjoyable to watch a mass of shots showing how depressed a character is. I got that his life was a big depressing abyss from the first hour. Why belabor the point? I was disappointed with this film from the beginning, but since I am such a fan of the whole cast and thought Robert DeNiro would be going somewhere with the story, I kept at it. I have learned my lesson.
If you enjoy movies for enjoyment sake, don't watch this movie. If, however, you are in an acting or film class, sure, watch it and learn how to be depressing.

good shepard, BAD movie.......2007-07-05

Wow - I like all kinds of movies, and thought the combination of story, DiNiro and a great cast would make this a great flick...NOT. This is one of the most boring, overly complex and simply crappy movie I have ever seen. I thought the Larry the Cable Guy disaster 'Health Inspector' was the bottom of the barrel - we just found a new bottom with this one.

The main problem I find with this movie is the total focus on the dedicated, dull character Matt Damon plays. Mind you, there are a few great moments (especially when he talks to Pesci), but just no enough to make this 'compelling'. Acutally, when I see that word describing a movie on the box, I tend to think that this is really the only verb one could use because 'good' would be a stretch!

With all the really great and even mediocre movies out there, pass on this one...you'll be glad you did.

CIA spies.......2007-07-04

Movie was great - a little slow at times, but the subject matter was very interesting....

C.I.A. Confused I Am.......2007-07-03

The Good Shephard was one of those movies I had no desire to see in theaters so I rented it with a friend instead. I love movies that involve your complete attention and have to be watched more than once to catch everything- but this movie was terrible. It jumped around way too much and left little explanations for any actions that were performed. Unless you knew exactly what was going on during which year, and I'm assuming most people don't, then you become confused and aggravated trying desperatly to figure out what they are talking about. My friend was even more aggravated than I was.

I don't recommend the movie if you are looking to be educated on the birth of the CIA.

Also, there is violence and sexuality in this movie so it may not be appropriate for kids.

Boring as Heck !!!!!!.......2007-06-28

I like DeNiro, I like Damon, and I really like conspiracy movies. So I was really hyped to see this. Than I did...And it was the most boring movie I've ever seen!!! How can DeNiro who's been so fun to watch for the past 20 years and Matt Damon who I loved in the Ocean's 11, 12, and 13 movies suck it up so bad in this? Now the acting is really great and that's about the only redeeming quality about this movie, but I didn't see it to see great acting. I wanted to be entertained and this movie really didn't help there.

If you see it, than make sure your not sitting comfortably because your going to fall asleep. I did about 1 hour in and than woke up 5 mintues later to see that nothing exciting was happening and I fell back to sleep.

The Bourne Identity (Widescreen Extended Edition)

Average customer rating:

The Bourne Identity - A Truely Awesome Movie!
Bourne Identity
Shame on who made this
Action packed and re-watchable!
Though not a masterpiece, a movie worth watching

The Bourne Identity (Widescreen Extended Edition)
Starring: Matt Damon , Franka Potente , Chris Cooper , Clive Owen , and Brian Cox
Director: Doug Liman
Manufacturer: Universal Studios
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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ASIN: B00023B1LC
Release Date: 2004-07-13

Amazon.com

Freely adapted from Robert Ludlum's 1980 bestseller, The Bourne Identity starts fast and never slows down. The twisting plot revs up in Zurich, where amnesiac CIA assassin Jason Bourne (Matt Damon), with no memory of his name, profession, or recent activities, recruits a penniless German traveler (Run Lola Run's Franka Potente) to assist in solving the puzzle of his missing identity. While his CIA superior (Chris Cooper) dispatches assassins to kill Bourne and thus cover up his failed mission, Bourne exercises his lethal training to leave a trail of bodies from Switzerland to Paris. Director Doug Liman (Go) infuses Ludlum's intricate plotting with a maverick's eye for character detail, matching breathtaking action with the humorous, thrill-seeking chemistry of Damon and Potente. Previously made as a 1988 TV movie starring Richard Chamberlain, The Bourne Identity benefits from the sharp talent of rising stars, offering intelligent, crowd-pleasing excitement from start to finish. --Jeff Shannon

Customer Reviews:

The Bourne Identity - A Truely Awesome Movie!.......2007-06-14

Hip, clever, well written/acted/filmed/directed! A visual feast from start to finish! Matt Damon is Jason Bourne! A must own for all action fans! A truely awesome movie!

Bourne Identity.......2007-06-11

Great fast-paced action, lots of special racing scenes. Great, but simple plot which is vastly improved by Matt Damon's acting. I would recommend this movie to anyone's DVD library.

Shame on who made this.......2007-06-10

This is a great movie but whoever made the dvd really messed up the captions. The extended version has no captions and the other it is more subtitles and difficult to turn on. If the extended has no captions someone tell me the point of buying this dvd?

Action packed and re-watchable! .......2007-05-26

I don't know about this extended version, I saw the movie in the theater and then on pay per view several times. Great suspense, excellent fight scened, Matt Damon at his, in my opinion, best. Great editing and direction, this movie does not slow down and is one of my all time favorite action suspense flicks.

Though not a masterpiece, a movie worth watching.......2007-05-20

The Bourne Identity brings to the screen the story of a young man dragged out of the Mediterranean Sea and without a clue as to who he is. His only lead is a bank account in Zurich. His problems, however, have only just begun...
Matt Damon is amazing in his respective role though the rest of the cast fail to follow with the exception of lovely Julia Stiles who seems to have quite a bit of potential.
The setting, the plot, the dialogues, and the music are all good, but nothing extraordinary.
In a nutshell, it's probably not a movie you would want to add to your collection, but it will provide for an evening's entertainment.

The Bourne Supremacy (Widescreen Edition)

Average customer rating:

???
Very entertaining... better then the Bourne Identity
A Worthy Sequel!
HD Version No Better than Non-HD
James Bond meets Jack Bauer

The Bourne Supremacy (Widescreen Edition)
Starring: Matt Damon , Franka Potente , Brian Cox , Julia Stiles , and Karl Urban
Director: Paul Greengrass
Manufacturer: Universal Studios
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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ASIN: B0002ZDVEU
Release Date: 2004-12-07

Customer Reviews:

???.......2007-07-09

After reading several others reviews it is painfully obvious that nobody read the books. The Ludlum books are fantastic. Bourne Identity while having many inconsitencies with the book was still somewhat close. Supremacy jumps onto another track altogether and is a completely different story than Ludlums Supremacy, I dread the release of Ultimatum as there is no possible way for this series to get back on track. Do yourself a favor and jump to the books section of Amazon and pick up all three and read them instead of allowing Hollywood to destroy literature. The books are so much better.

Very entertaining... better then the Bourne Identity.......2007-07-09

First off, I thought the unsteady camerawork was great. It perfectly matched the unbalanced state of Bourne's mind. The action was terrific and the plot was tight. I enjoyed Supremacy more than Identity, though the latter followed Ludlum's book more closely.

Must admit that one of the biggest pluses to me was killing off Marie at the very beginning. She was annoying in the extreme and nothing but an encumbrance because her character had nowhere to go.

On the bad side, I couldn't help but wonder why JB kept using his own passport. Since Identity established that he had lots of passports with different names on them, it was surprising that they weren't utilized. Secondly, I really felt that they could have played up the instability in Bourne's mind even more. Having him more unbalanced would have made a more sympathetic figure and made the viewer pull for him all the more.

I thought the ending was a bit hackish, but I guess the scene is being set for the final installment.

A Worthy Sequel!.......2007-06-14

A great action sequel to the first movie! I can not wait for the next one!

HD Version No Better than Non-HD.......2007-05-27

This is a great movie - but don't bother buying the HD version as it is not a noticeable improvement in picture quality from the original. I have a very good regular DVD player that uploads to an HD output by interpolating the missing pixels from a regular DVD and outputing it in 1080 HD. The good HD movies are much, much better than the interpolated regular DVD movie (Chronicles of Riddick, Enter the Dragon are much, much better) whereas the average HD movies - like the Bourne Supremacy - don't look much different. Save your money and buy other HD movies that make a difference in picture quality. If you don't own this movie - then buy it because it is amazing - if you own it in regular DVD format already - don't bother buying the HD version as the picture quality is not much better and doesn't justify the extra spend.

James Bond meets Jack Bauer.......2007-05-21

The Bourne Supremacy picks up two years after the original film ended and continues to shed light on Jason Bourne's adventures. The former assassin returns to Europe to find out why he is still hunted down by the CIA.
Matt Damon, Karl Urban (from LOR!), and the rest of the cast carry out their performances very well (Matt Damon is once again amazing in his respective role!).
Moreover, it was a pleasure to see the lovely Julia Stiles, though a bit more exposure would have been just right...
Overall, the setting, the plot, the dialogues, and the music are all good.
In short, The Bourne Supremacy is a movie definitely worth watching and one to seriously consider adding to your movie collection!

Average customer rating:

A good movie,
Brilliant low-key film
Get On the Boat, Do Your Job, Get Back Home
A little disappointing
Taut suspense!

Breach (Full Screen Edition)
Starring: Chris Cooper , Ryan Phillippe , Laura Linney , Caroline Dhavernas , and Gary Cole
Director: Billy Ray
Manufacturer: Universal Studios
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

General | Drama | Genres | DVD | Video

Suspense | Mystery & Suspense | Genres | DVD | Video

Mystery | Mystery & Suspense | Genres | DVD | Video

General | Mystery & Suspense | Genres | DVD | Video

Espionage | Action & Adventure | Genres | DVD | Video

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ASIN: B000OYAT44
Release Date: 2007-06-12

Customer Reviews:

A good movie,.......2007-07-07

but I wouldn't call it screen material. It should have been put on one of the local networks. The trailors made this movie seem like a thriller drama. At every corner I was waiting for the big revelation but what was told didn't even seem real. I actually thought maybe there would be a twist and it was going to turn out that the cia had set up Eric. Obviously, I didn't know that much about the Robert Hansaan story! Anyway, it is a good movie but just not a movie I would put in the theaters.

Brilliant low-key film.......2007-06-26

Breach is amazingly excellent, and is a much more complicated film than the trailers for it made it appear. The trailers advertised it as a cat-and-mouse game between an up-and-coming newbie and a diabolically clever and seasoned veteran. Not so. Hanssen in the movie is not vilified as a devious traitor so much as presented as a seriously disturbed individual suffering from a crippling need for attention and recognition. In short, he's a sad, mentally ill individual. Rather than eagerly anticipating the moment of his capture, I found myself actually feeling sorry for him. This humanness made the film much more poignant and effective than it would have been had they played it as a Ludlumesque spy thriller. Cooper, by the way, deserves an Oscar. Phillippe simply should not have been used. One peculiarity that bugged me throughout the film though was that both lead actors sported such copious amounts of makeup that it was easily visible in all of the scenes. Every close up of Phillippe painfully revealed not only that he wore eyeliner, but mascara and lipstick as well. Oh well. One other minor thing that irked me throughout the film was all the stupid stuff thrown in it about lie detection. This was obviously thrown in to up the "intrigue factor," and only ended up resulting in a glaring inconsistency in the film: If Cooper's character can tell when Phillippe's character is lying every single time they play the "lie detection game," then why can't he ever tell when he's lying throughout the rest of the film? Annoying. The obvious answer is that you really can't tell when someone is lying, unless they contradict themselves. Research on polygraphs show that they can't outperform chance, and that neither can trained agents.

Get On the Boat, Do Your Job, Get Back Home .......2007-06-22

"The Robert Hanssen spying case, which broke in early 2001, was -- it is so clear now -- the harbinger of 9/11, a big honking symptom of the entrenched, institutional problems at the FBI that let big clues slip by, clues that might have prevented the horrors of that day. In the annals of disgruntled employees, Robert Hanssen, career FBI agent, is close to the top of the list. He was intel, and, as Hanssen (Chris Cooper) explains to the agent wannabe assigned to work as his assistant, Eric O'Neill (Ryan Phillippe), the intel side of the FBI gets no respect. Hanssen is a computer expert, and he's been railing at the Bureau to upgrade its antiquated systems for years -- no one listens, because it's only the guys with guns who are paid any heed, only the guys with guns who get the big promotions. It is the "organizational arrogance" of the FBI, Hanssen assures O'Neill, that has prevented Hanssen from advancing as he deserves to... and, the unspoken undertone is, that prevented the many warnings of 9/11 we've heard about -- field reports from intel agents, for instance --from being given the weight of urgency they deserved. And, oy, don't get Hanssen started on the lack of interagency cooperation between the FBI and the CIA. (We see that lack almost sink the FBI's investigation into Hanssen, too.) " Peter Travers

At one point Eric O'Neill, played so ably by Ryan Philippe becomes so discouraged with his FBI career he goes to his father to discuss whether he should quit. His father tells him the philosophy of his seafaring father, which is an analogy for life. "Get on the boat, do your job, and get back home'. Eric O'Neill is a surveillance-op for the FBI and his goal is to be promoted to a full Agent status. On one day he is called into a meeting with Agent Burroughs, played by Laura Linney. She tells him he is being assigned to the desk of Robert Hanssen, and that Hanssen is suspected of posting explicit sexual content on the Internet. His job will be to watch Hanssen's every move and to report back to Burroughs. Within a short while O'Neill doubts his job, as he has come to respect Hanssen.

O'Neill confronts Burroughs and the real story is told. Hanssen has been feeding top secret information to our enemies for twenty years, and the damage is in the millions of dollars and dozens of lives. Now O'Neill finds himself pitted against one of the finest minds in the FBI. A real cat and mouse game begins.

The drama and suspense in this movie is overwhelming, but so finely tuned that as the story unravels, you begin to feel you are part of the action. This story is partially known as the story begins. However, the story progresses and the finely detailed life of Robert Hanssen is laid bare. The power of the finale is not diminished at all. The ending is ambiguous and we are left to wonder about the man Hanssen. This is a delicious story of the real world of politics and espionage. The real story is that of the relationship that develops between O'Neill and Hanssen. The mind games that are played and built leave us bewitched and bothered. Chris Cooper is phenomenal as Hanssen. One of the better acting roles I have seen this year. Ryan Philippe playing O'Neill is the perfect foil.

Heartily, highly recommended. prisrob 6-22-07

A little disappointing.......2007-06-18

The Robert Hanssen story--that of an Opus Dei (extremely conservative) Catholic making kinky movies of him and his wife and their sexual experiences is by nature titillating. The contradiction between the rabid anti-Communist and his selling secrets to the Soviet Union is intriguing. So my interest in this case had led me to read a lot about it, and to anticipate this film eagerly.

I regret to say I found the film less in line with the depth of the story than I would have liked.

To be perfectly honest, despite how much I admire Chris Cooper's acting, I wondered how he could play Hanssen who he doesn't resemble. Cooper didn't let me down (though, frankly, I don't recall from what I read that Hanssen was as arrogant as the character in the film seemed. But perhaps I don't remember that, or that character was made that way "for dramatic effect.)

There was a little discussion in the script of Hanssen's sexual deviance. There was one line referring to his taste for "a stripper." That's where I felt the film was less accurate than I'd have liked. And I therefore think the film's theme, of Hanssen's overwhelming, conniving brilliance, was inaccurate. Allow me to explain.

The script indicated that Hanssen was so smart that the bureau didn't see through his clever, shrewd planning. In real life, the "stripper" issue was a major issue, not just a script one-liner. Hanssen had a relationship with a dancer at a club I'm familiar with in Washington. More important, my reading indicated that he took her to some FBI event in I think Tokyo, or somewhere in Asia, and the FBI didn't notice. Here's an Opus Dei Catholic travelling with a young woman he's not married to and the bureau didn't notice? So one can infer the bureau's ineptitude rather than Hanssen's brilliance.

Indeed, authors don't know that Hanssen had more than a platonic relationship with the stripper. And I don't recall from what I read that Hanssen was taking movies of him and his wife and their sexual activities. I think he described them in lurid detail on what was ostensibly his web page. And at least one author indicated that he wasn't absolutely sure it was Hanssen's web page. (All right, there was solid evidence that it was--or couldn't have been someone else's--but it wasn't cut and dry). But movie or not, sexual or not, something pretty blatant, something a school kid would have noticed the bureau didn't see. I'm afraid in that sense, the film left the FBI off with much less guilt than I would have.

My spouse was concerned that there wasn't enough discussion of Opus Dei and Hanssen's affliation therewith. Indeed, in one of the deleted scenes, there was a little more said about Hanssen's daughter sleeping on a board, for example. But to me that wasn't something the script needed to dwell on more than it did.

Overall it was a pretty good thriller, the type that keeps you on the edge of your seat despite your knowing what's going to happen. And the bonus material asks some of Hanssen's colleagues why they think Hanssen did what he did. While I won't give away their answers, they seem pretty reasonable. But if you want a more accurate view of what happened, I suggest you read many of the fine books available on the subject.

Taut suspense!.......2007-06-18

Even though viewers know how this film will end, the writing is so good that the suspense builds pretty much constantly throughout the entire film. Acting and production values are excellent as well. The scenes between O'Neill and his wife were, for me, the weakest element; it just didn't ring true to me that he could keep her at such a distance throughout his difficult assignment. The final scene also struck me as a bit too melodramatic. But the rest of the film had me going for sure -- I'd give it four and a half stars for its genre.

Average customer rating:

Why review it before you've even seen it on HD?
The only things preserved are a few names

The Bourne Identity [HD DVD]
Starring: Chris Cooper , Matt Damon , Tim Dutton , Walt Goggins , and Orso Maria Guerrini
Director: Doug Liman
Manufacturer: Universal Studios
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: HD DVD

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Espionage | Action & Adventure | Genres | DVD | Video

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ASIN: B000QEIOTO
Release Date: 2007-07-24

Customer Reviews:

Why review it before you've even seen it on HD?.......2007-06-13

[...]This film has believable action compared to the last few Bond films before Casino Royale and has some great set pieces, this is what action films should be like, great acting from Matt Damon and supporting cast, I even love the music as well and cant wait for this to come out on HD DVD as the 2nd film looks awesome on it. [...]

The only things preserved are a few names.......2007-06-04

As far as a shoot-um-up with the obligatory car chase goes, this movie did it quite well. And like many of the other "1984" (book by George Orwell in which to satisfy the proletariat they had a machine mass produce formula pulp fiction) type machine churned out films for the proletariat, the title and a few names bare the only resemblance to the Ludlum story. Quite a few of the characters that give this story depth and mystery are left out of the movie completely.

Fortunately or unfortunately it is easy to get wrapped unpin technology as assume that high definition (HD) or even 3Dis going to take the place of Carlos and the search for his real identity.

Now let's not compare this quickie in shoot-up land with the well thought out book "The Bourne Identity" by Robert Ludlum or the much better portrait of the story portrayed in the Mini-Series "The Bourne Identity" (1988) starring Richard Chamberlain and Jaclyn Smith; then we can enjoy what is left.

A sailor on a fishing trawler spots a human body in the water. After retrieving it we find it is alive. Helping this stranger back from the near dead we find a couple of bullet holes and a mysterious capsule under his skin. The capsule displays what the fisherman recognizes immediately as a Swiss bank account. The man can not remember who he is. Now we follow along with his journey to Switzerland and find out if he will recover. In the mean time someone is out to kill him. Why?

Average customer rating:

The Film Makers Forgot Something
proof of dumbing down of American film audience
Gorgeous George
Tries to do too much in too little space.
Ambitious But Disjointed

Syriana (Widescreen Edition)
Starring: Kayvan Novak , George Clooney , Amr Waked , Christopher Plummer , and Jeffrey Wright
Director: Stephen Gaghan
Manufacturer: Warner Home Video
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ASIN: B000F7CMRM
Release Date: 2006-06-20

Product Description

Big oil means big money. Very big money. And that fact unleashes corruption that stretches from Houston to Washington to the Mideast ? and ensnares industrialists, princes, spies, politicos, oilfield laborers and terrorists in a deadly, deceptive web of move and
countermove. This lightning-paced, whip-smart action thriller grips your mind and nerves with an intensity that doesn't let go for an instant.
Running Time: 128 min.

Format: DVD MOVIE

Amazon.com

Syriana is an oil-based soap opera set against the world of global oil cartels. It is to the oil industry as Traffic was to the drug trade (no surprise, since writer/director Stephen Gaghan wrote the screenplay to Traffic): a sprawling attempt to portray the vast political, business, social, and personal implications of a societal addiction, in this case, oil. A major merger between two of the world's largest oil companies reveals ethical dilemmas for the lawyer charged with making the deal (Jeffrey Wright), and major global implications beyond the obvious; a CIA operative (George Clooney) discovers the truth about his work, and the people he works for; a young oil broker (Matt Damon) encounters personal tragedy, then partners with an idealistic Gulf prince (Alexander Siddig) attempting to build a new economy for his people, only to find he's opposed by powers far beyond his control. Meanwhile, disenfranchised Pakistani youths are lured into terrorism by a radical Islamic cleric. And that's just the start. As in Traffic, in one way or another all of the characters' fates are tied to each other, whether they realize it or not, though the connections are sometimes tenuous. While Syriana is basically a good film with timely resonance, it can't quite seem to measure up to Gaghan's ambitious vision and it very nearly collapses under the weight of its many storylines. Fortunately they are resolved skillfully enough to keep the film from going under in the end. To some viewers, Syriana will seem like an unfocused and over-loaded film that goes, all at once, everywhere and nowhere. Others will find it to be an important work earnestly exploring major issues. In either case, it's a film that deserves to be taken seriously, and it's likely to be one that will be talked about for a long time to come. --Dan Vancini

Beyond Syriana

The soundtrack
More from Participant Productions
Why We Love Jeffrey Wright

Starring George Clooney
Oscar Central
See No Evil: The True Story of a Ground Soldier in the CIA's War on Terrorism

Stills from Syriana (click for larger image)

Customer Reviews:

The Film Makers Forgot Something .......2007-06-07

Way don't these film makers simply admit this is their way to speak out against the oil? If they want the corruption stopped due to dealing with the middle east, why don't they support drilling in America.

I realize those of us who watched this are suppose to support anti-oil groups due to the corruption. Not every person dealing with oil is corrupt. Those who made this movie are the corrupt ones. They are the ones who traveled in planes. They are the ones who traveled in limos. They are the ones who used jeeps and automobiles to make the movie. Oil was required to make this movie. You in hollywood need to shut up! Why don't you in hollywood develop a business to build automobiles that do not require oil/gas? Oh yeah, you just want others to do that. I WISH SOMEONE WOULD MAKE A MOVIE ON HOW CORRUPT HOLLYWOOD IS!

proof of dumbing down of American film audience.......2007-05-31

The number of negative reviews here, esp. of the "I didn't get, it left me baffled" type, even after 5 years of blood-for-oil war on 2 fronts, is a directly proportional gauge of the self indulgent ignorance of Americans at large regarding their own oil addiction and its genocidal consequences.

A possible cure is for these willfully cretinous simpletons to buy the DVD and watch the 2nd "special feature" , "Participate & make a difference/change".

This film is the best you can hope for from Hollywood regarding geopolitical analysis, and readily stands up to multiple viewing, but, without more than two brain cells to rub together, or the lack of self discipline to think any harder than necessary to watch Wizard of Oz, even Tinseltown's best efforts are wasted as pearl before swine, a Biblical reference for Jack Abramoff's captive gospel thumping flag wrapped "patriots" in hope it might be their access to enlightment as to, and thereby salvation from, their sins perpetrated in the name of the marketed greed branded as civic duty to consume like locusts.

If you still don't get it but want to, READ THE BOOK by Robt Baer.

Gorgeous George.......2007-05-29

I hate to give this movie any rating because I just couldn't get through it. The film was visually dark, the actors mumbled, and the scenes were disjointed. Sorry George, you're gorgeous but this movie wasn't for me.

Tries to do too much in too little space........2007-05-27

Syriana (Stephen Gaghan, 2005)

I wondered, after seeing Syriana, if I was the only person on the planet who just didn't get it. Then I checked IMDB, and found that Gaghan (Abandon) was the guy who wrote the screenplay for Steven Soderbergh's loathsome adaptation of the much better TV miniseries Traffik. Yeah, I didn't get that, either. I readily admit that I liked Syriana a whole lot better, but it does follow the same pattern-- there are a whole lot of people doing a whole lot of stuff in a relatively short timeframe, with the unavoidable side-effect that you don't spend anywhere near enough time with the various characters to develop any sort of empathy for them (or, for what it's worth, apathy). Some of the performances are good, some are excellent, but each of those-- especially George Clooney's much-lauded performance-- just left me wondering how good the movie could have been had it found a focus at any point during its two hours. I know I'm very much in the minority on this, but I didn't like it. **

Ambitious But Disjointed.......2007-05-21

Syrian tells the story of a high-level, U.S. conspiracy to install an easily manipulated, half-wit playboy as the ruler of an oil-rich fictitious nation, Syriana, rather than his brother, a PhD economist with independent-minded aspirations to actually help his country.

I found the plot disjointed at times - particularly in certain subplots. For instance, it wasn't clear to me why the oil analyst had reason to blame the Syriana royal for the drowning of the analyst's son at the royal's party. The political alignment and motivations of the terrorists who torture the movie's main character were just as murky.

Part of the problem was the script, which went overboard in trying to show rather than tell what was going on. A little explanation at times is appropriate and necessary if you don't want the story to lose the audience's understanding and attention.

For a compelling, geopolitical thriller set entirely in a real oil-rich state, check out SAUDI MATCH POINT. It tells the story of U.S. and Chinese competition for Saudi oil and influence while weaving in a local drama set in one of the world's most repressive and bizarre societies. The novel is available online from the publisher, Blacksmith Books.

The Hunt for Red October (Special Collector's Edition)

Average customer rating:

Like, so 80's
The hunt for Red October
Excellent Movie
Cold war movie
The Hunt is OVER ... for a great Submarine Thriller!

The Hunt for Red October (Special Collector's Edition)
Starring: Sean Connery , Alec Baldwin , Scott Glenn , Sam Neill , and James Earl Jones
Director: John McTiernan
Manufacturer: Paramount
ProductGroup: DVD
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Clear and Present Danger (Special Collector's Edition)
The Fugitive
U-571 (Collector's Edition)
Apollo 13 (Widescreen 2-Disc Anniversary Edition)
K-19: The Widowmaker

ASIN: B00008K76U
Release Date: 2003-05-06

Amazon.com essential video

Before Harrison Ford assumed the mantle of playing Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan hero in Patriot Games, Alec Baldwin took a swing at the character in this John McTiernan film and hit one to the fence. If less instantly sympathetic than Ford, Baldwin is in some respects more interesting and nuanced as Ryan, and drawing comparisons between both actors' performances can make for some interesting postmovie discussion. That aside, The Hunt for Red October stands alone as a uniquely exciting adventure with a fantastic costar: Sean Connery as a Russian nuclear submarine captain attempting to defect to the West on his ship. Ryan must figure out his true motives for approaching the U.S. McTiernan (Predator, Die Hard) made an exceptionally handsome movie here with action sequences that really do take one's breath away. --Tom Keogh

Description

Based on Tom Clancy's bestseller, directed by John McTiernan (Die Hard) and starring Sean Connery and Alec Baldwin, THE HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER sweats with high-tech anxiety and the tension of men who hold Doomsday in their hands. A new technologically-superior Soviet nuclear sub, the Red October, is heading for the U.S. coast under the command of Captain Marko Ramius (Connery). The American government thinks Ramius is planning to attack. A lone CIA analyst (Baldwin) has a different idea: he thinks Ramius is planning to defect, but he has only a few hours to find him and prove it - because the entire Russian naval and air commands are trying to find him, too. The hunt is on!

Customer Reviews:

Like, so 80's.......2007-06-24

This is a really good yarn, but the film adaptation is marginal - Connery and Baldwin are real, compelling, and entertaining, but the other actors leave much to be desired. Some really good shots of underwater scenes, and a good suspense level, but the acting could add a lot to this film.

The hunt for Red October.......2007-05-27

Connery at his best. A fantastic film. Definitely an owner movie.

Excellent Movie.......2007-05-02

I can't stand Alec Baldwin, but he did well in his first major motion picture. Sean Connery was good as he always is. I liked everything about it. The music is good. The special effects don't match these days, but I can live with it. A very dramatic, well acted movie I think.

Cold war movie.......2007-02-18

This is a great movie about the cold war with excellent casting and directing. I had read the book so when I first saw the movie I was a bit dissapointed from the fact that some of the important factors were underplayed in the movie. However this movie really grew on me and it is really entertaining.

The Hunt is OVER ... for a great Submarine Thriller!.......2007-01-21

I just finished watching the Hunt for Red October for the jilienth time... It had occurred to me that I never have written a review for this great movie here at amazon.com... I have reviewed the great WWII movie Das Boot, the hilarious Operation Petticoat, I have even put together two different lists about submarine books and submarine movies but incredibly I have not written a review about this great movie! I remember the first time I saw this movie when it came out in movie theaters and thinking, "Wow! How did Clancy know that, I thought that was classified?" I served on submarines in the `70s and considered myself very informed about submarines. This is a great Cold War yarn that will keep you on the edge of your seat - If you want to see a first rate submarine thriller then Hunt for Red October is a sure bet!

Breach (Combo HD DVD and Standard DVD) [HD DVD]

Average customer rating:

Breach smeach
Brilliant low-key film

Breach (Combo HD DVD and Standard DVD) [HD DVD]
Starring: Gary Cole , Chris Cooper , Bruce Davison , Mary Jo Deschanel , and Dennis Haysbert
Director: Billy Ray
Manufacturer: Universal Studios
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: HD DVD

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ASIN: B000OYAT4E
Release Date: 2007-06-12

Customer Reviews:

Breach smeach.......2007-07-06

I was heavily disappointed after and throughout this movie. While I must say that Chris Cooper did an excellent job, I'm not so sure about his counterpart Ryan Phillippe. At times I couldn't tell if it was poor acting, or if it was done on purpose to exaggerate the fact that he was lying. I'm leaning toward this first. This movie seriously lacked action. Aside from a few somewhat tense moments when you think Cooper might be on to Phillippe, the most action occurred when Cooper fired his gun into the air. Very predictable, they didn't even throw in any twists or anything interesting. I could have written this movie between simulations at work. Not to mention the score sounded like a ripoff of Beethoven's 'Moonlight Sonata'.

Brilliant low-key film.......2007-06-26

Average customer rating:

Not great, but not bad
Top notch film starring Denzel Washington
kinda wet (as opposed to all wet)
Best Punisher Movie Ever Made
Worse than tripe.

Man on Fire
Starring: Denzel Washington , Dakota Fanning , Marc Anthony , Radha Mitchell , and Christopher Walken
Director: Tony Scott
Manufacturer: 20th Century Fox
ProductGroup: DVD
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ASIN: B00005JN0W
Release Date: 2004-09-14

Product Description

Hard-drinking, burnt-out ex-CIA operative John Creasy (Washington) has given up on life--until his friend Rayburn (Oscar winner Christopher Walken) gets him a job as a bodyguard to nine-year-old Pita Ramos (Dakota Fanning). Bit by bit, Creasy begins to reclaim his soul, but when Pita is kidnapped, Creasy unleashes a firestorm of apocalyptic vengeance against everyone responsible.

Amazon.com

Style trumps substance in Man on Fire, a slick, brooding reunion of Crimson Tide star Denzel Washington and director Tony Scott. The ominous, crime-ridden setting is Mexico City, where a dour, alcoholic warrior with a mysterious Black Ops past (Washington) seeks redemption as the devoted bodyguard of a lovable 9-year-old girl (the precociously gifted Dakota Fanning), then responds with predictable fury when she is kidnapped. Prolific screenwriter Brian Helgeland (Mystic River, L.A. Confidential) sets a solid emotional foundation for Washington's tormented character, and Scott's stylistic excess compensates for a distended plot that's both repellently violent and viscerally absorbing. Among Scott's more distracting techniques is the use of free-roaming, comic-bookish subtitles... even when they're unnecessary! Adapted from a novel by A.J. Quinnell and previously filmed as a 1987 vehicle for Scott Glenn, Man on Fire is roughly on par with Scott's similar 1990 film Revenge, efficiently satisfying Washington's incendiary bloodlust under a heavy blanket of humid, doom-laden atmosphere. --Jeff Shannon

Customer Reviews:

Not great, but not bad.......2007-06-20

To my surprise, Tony Scott's remake of Man On Fire isn't the war crime I was expecting by a long shot. Horribly over-directed in places, true, but nowhere near as irritating as Domino, which is the closest ADDS filmmaking has come to projectile vomiting at the audience to date. It helps that Scott has a decent script and a good cast to keep his worst excesses in check, and it has to be said that some of the stylistic touches (such as the very active subtitling) are really pretty good. He's better at framing the surrounding scenes than some of the big moments, which are fairly tension and adrenaline-free for all their imagination, but he's prepared to get his hands far dirtier than you'd expect from a mainstream studio picture, and he even manages a couple of moments of emotional resonance as well. It's certainly much better than the dire original, which only had a good John Scott score (part of which turned up in Die Hard) going for it (aside from the film's change of location from Italy to Mexico, the song has changed from Someone to Watch Over Me - well, Ridley beat him to that one - to Linda Ronstadt's infinitely less relevant cover of Blue Bayou). Good to see Christopher Walken in a good guy role again, too.

Top notch film starring Denzel Washington.......2007-06-19

Man on Fire is one of the best crime drama films I have had the pleasure of viewing. Set in the heart of Mexico, the film tells a fantastic story that is backed up by great direction and cinematic appeal. With that said, you throw in top notch actors like Denzel Washington and Christopher Walken and it does more than make the grade.

Man on Fire centers on John Creasy, a burned out loner type whose only resolve in the present day is a bottle of liquor. Creasy meets up with an old friend (played by Walken) who turns him towards work as a bodyguard for a family's daughter in Mexico, a place where multiple ransom based kidnappings occur on a regular basis. Given his extensive background of military accomplishments which includes counter terrorism and Special Forces (to name a few) he is hired almost immediately, although he himself is reluctant about the new role.

The character development of Creasy is excellent, but I would have to attribute that as much to the screen presence of Denzel as I would anything else. Overall the direction of this movie is superb, using captions when necessary and applying some different camera uses in regards to angles and perception to allow different moods to be invoked for a specific scene. Dakota Fanning plays as the daughter that he is supposed to protect, and I feel was a good choice for the role. As the movie moves on, we learn little about Creasy's past but get to explore him tearing down some walls in the present, as both a "vigilante with a vengeance" persona as well as seeing the human compassion side of him in his adoration of the little girl he is paid to protect. The film has it all when it comes to twists and turns as well as themes of corruption, family, and revenge. As Creasy says it best in the movie; "revenge is a dish best served cold". The films emotional conclusion is still a stoic ending when you take into account all the harrowing events and actions that led up to it. I feel what makes this film so much better than many of its kind is the ability to evoke a great seriousness within the main character while putting him in a dire situation throughout much of the film.

Bonus Disc: If you were a fan of this film when it first came out then you may enjoy this particular "Collector's edition Steelbook" package, which features a bonus disk chocked with extra's including multiple trailers, behind the scenes footage and an interesting documentary that talks about the ransom based kidnappings that take place in places like Mexico on a regular basis. Also discussed somewhat is the history of this story which originally came from a novel and had an initial film made about it starring Scott Glenn several years ago.

kinda wet (as opposed to all wet).......2007-06-12

How do you take a decent script, fine cast and turn it into average, run-of-the-mill, uninteresting film fare?
Easy. Get a no-talent hack like Tony Scott to direct--with his whirling dervish, idiotic, mindless, pointless,
car commercial, dizzying camera moves and editing.

It's sad. Because Denzel is working his butt off here, so is the incredible Dakota Fanning, not to mention the fine cameo that Chris Walken turns in--depressingly enough, Tony Scott simply will not leave the camera alone...and keeps spinning it, twisting it, whirling it, gliding with it--not to mention the constant changing from 16 mm to 35mm to Super 8 mm...Man oh man; this is infuriating.

And he does it every damn time. He did it with Top Gun, Days of Thunder... Why destroy otherwise excellent performances with incredibly useless, distracting camera moves? WHO ARE YOU TRYING TO IMPRESS? THE CAMERA SHOULD NOT BE NOTICED AT ALL! don't you understand that? You pull the audiance out of the fantacy by making them aware of your relentless camera SHENANIGANS.

I just don't get it.

Hey, Mr. Scott: it's very simple. Leave the actors be. Let them do what they were hired to do--which is to act! We don't need to know your camera is (always) there. Period. (In fact, we preffer it when we do not know the camera exists at all!)

Take a look at some of the late, great John Ford's films. Want to see the way a film should be directed? Take a look at John Ford. Please.

Best Punisher Movie Ever Made.......2007-05-28

I've seen Man On Fire multiple times since it's original release, and it never ceases to amaze me. Often times critics will reference a mild weakness in the plot, which I for the life of me cannot seem to find. I understand that Tony Scott's directing techniques may not necessarily be for everyone, but this is a film that simply would not be the same without it. From frenetic pans and out-of-focus shots to overlapping of frames and free-roaming subtitles, the direction and editing in Man On Fire takes the viewer into the chaotic plot of a man not only out for revenge, but a sense of self-redemption (assumably).

The only thing I'd really like to point out is in relation to the title of my review. For any comic book reader out there that was seriously disappointed with The Punisher movie, I'd highly recommend this as a substitute. Man On Fire is pretty much the very essence of the Marvel Comics character, with the exception of his name being Creasy and being a black guy. But everything about this flick radiates Frank Castle.

Worse than tripe........2007-05-24

The worst aspects of human nature exploited for entertainment value. I guess it's a sign of the times.

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DVD

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Dick Tracy Meets Gruesome

The soundtrack	More from Participant Productions	Why We Love Jeffrey Wright
Starring George Clooney	Oscar Central	See No Evil: The True Story of a Ground Soldier in the CIA's War on Terrorism