Equilibrium - RKMBs

I don't know if many of you have heard of this one, but it's 1 or 2 years old and I hadnt seen it until recently. It stars Christian Bale, Taye Diggs and Sean Bean. It's a post WWIII era where anti-emotion drugs are enforced upon the people so that there is no crime or war. All forms of creative thinking are illegal and art and music are contraband.

I think this movie went straight to video, but if it hit the theaters, I missed it. I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised how much I enjoyed it. I love it when I give a film that I've never heard of before and end up with a surprise treat. It has 2000 style action elements but has subversiveness and thought provoking story elements much like Gattaca. It's got action, heart, science-fiction, A-List actors and good direction. Give it a shot if youre bored and want a cool flick.

Waiting for Jaburg countdown.......
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It was out in theatres.

Storywise, it's a watered down Brave New World, but the action scenes are fantastic. Very stylish, new age sets and costumes. Fun flick.

The final fight scene where Bale goes beserk was ridiculous.

Yup, was in theaters. Very breifly. Great movie. Like it alot.

I welcome the Jaburg countdown. I wasnt about to look through pages of internet forums before posting a meadering thought about a goddamn dvd.

Well glad peeps here dug it at least.

I actually saw this about two weeks before the big announcement, and I feel the same way about this movie. Not much on special effects, and the story is watered down, like you said, but the fight scenes are cool and original. That close combat fighting style was top notch, fo' shizzle.

Yeah, good movie. The son was fucking creepy. The gun kata thing was very crazy, but they explained it. My philosophy is if they give enough effort to explain something as being fact with psuedo science, then I'll accept it based on how they present it no matter how strange it might be.

I saw Ebert and Roeper review this movie. They said it was really good but they were afraid that people were going to pass it off as a Matrix rip-off.

This thread has been rated EC-10

Thats it. Tomorrow I steal all those fuckers screen caps put them somewhere I can actully use them.

That's what I passed it off as when I saw it on the video shelves (Matrix rip-off). Seriously, look at the cover. And I believe the phrase on the back was "What is the Equilibrium?" and the website was "www.entertheequilibruim.com".

I shit thee not.

What is the equilibrium? That blows. I do know it says "Forget the Matrix!" on the cover. Even that poor marketing turned me off. I would have been apt to watch it sooner if it didnt have all that Matrix garbage all over it.

I went out and got my own copy after I got it from Netflix.

My woman liked it and she's not keen on action films.

Chewy's been recomending this film for me. I can't wait to rent it. I'll probably wait until I'm back in Gainesville, so my roommate can watch it with me. We both this Bale is hot and Bean has a sexy voice.

Well I have to convince her somehow!

And I didn't like Matrix. Sorry. It just didn't excite me. A cute idea...but...that's about it. I've read about half of Brave New World, and the concept is very interesting, but it's just dragging right now.

However, I'm a BIG fan of Gattaca and novels like 1984 and F541. So if this movie blends material like that with the elements of Brave New World that I liked, I will in all likelyhood enjoy the film.

Plus, I mean, Christian Bale and Sean Bean are in it. That's a pretty darn good reason to see anything.

It's like 1984 if Winston was a serious badass.

Well shit, I'm gonna love this movie.

That's the avatar of my dreams!

Not even close to similar, but another fave of mine:

Wasn't there a really violent one like that involving a guy with a sword killing girlscouts or something?

Actually, it was Japanese schoolgirls...

Ah, there it is.

They look like Sailor Scouts to me...

Upon first watching Equilibrium, I was so intruigued by the fact that it was a cross between the three main dystopian future titles I've read (1984, Brave New World, and F451) that I made a list of all the similarities it had with the books.

...I'm such a nerd...

Okay...just saw it with Stephanie last night. I bought the DVD with a gift card, and I don't regret it. Here's a snippet of some of our comments last night, mainly for laughes.

(Bale and Bean step out of the car.)

S: Mhhh...Christian Bale...oh snap there's Bean!
J: With good hair for once. No more lookin' like Bono.
S: And he's not a terrorist.
J: Mhhh...Bale...

(The first shooting scene.)
S: The screen's blank. Is my DVD player broken?
J: But I can still here stuff -- oh crap they're shooting.
J and S: Two minutes of 'Holy Cow' 'Look at what he just did!' 'Rewind!'

(They are about to shoot the dogs.)
S: Jackie, why are we watching this? IF THEY KILL THE PUPPY I'M GOING TO HATE THIS MOVIE!
J: Jeez, woman!

(Puppy is in the trunk.)
S: He's gonna save the puppy. I LOVE THIS MOVIE!

Yeah, this movie is one of my favorites. Some might call it watered-down from some dsytopian novels, but really, I just saw it as a newer version of what people were writing about fifty years ago. I mean, we as a society are always popping pills, be it for depression, ADD, or erectile dysfunction. The pill in this movie is just another prescription.

Everyone's acting was awesome. Bale was great, and I really look forward to seeing him in the new Batman movie. The action scenes were excellent, but I really enjoyed that finale scene where he's grinning. Bean, having a very short role, was almost straight out of F451. Dang that good. Plus, as my roommate pointed out, we got to see him shirtless. I had to remind her that he was dead in the scene, so I don't think it counts. Diggs played quite the bastard, I think everyone watching the film was glad to see him get it.

My ONLY complaint about the film was that some of the words introducted to the film were not reinforced well enough for my to remember them. And really, if that's the worse complaint a movie gets, it's still highly rated.

And whoever did the marketing on this movie should be fired. I do not remember any commercials or movie trailers or newspaper ads for this movie. I don't even remember if I was living in Tampa or in Gainesville when it was released. No one I know has heard of this movie. Why? It's a good movie, dang it.

Tread softly, because you tread on my dreams.

LOL I have that on my AOLIM profile.

Yeah I didnt see it until I sat down bored with a couple buddies and saw it on their on demand thing. After watching it I ran out and got the widescreen dvd version.

About the drugs, what I enjoyed was the irony that their drug was enforced and it was UNlawful to not take it and that the primary prohibited drug was the high people got from natural human emotion.

By the way, I managed to watch part of the film version of Fahrenheit 451 last weekend, hoping it would be as good as the book.

Um, no way. I couldn't even sit down and watch the whole thing. I turned it off halfway through. Now, I don't think everything make in the 60s was crap, but this was one of those cases. Weird as it seems, Equilibrium was a far better remake of the novel than 1966 version. Props for Bale and Bean for actually getting the message across with far less effort than that Austrian guy from the 60s version.

That being said, I can't wait for the remake that Frank Darabont (The Green Mile) is working on. Hopefully, he'll get people that at least sound American. I can't get over Guy Montag sounding like Arnold.

I caught F451 on tv a little bit ago on Warner Classic Movies. It was a snooze fest.

I would have rather have watched fishing.

I watched like thirty five minutes not one person was shot.

Mind the uniform Cleric, I plan to be wearing it for a long time.

Equilibrium is just Fahrenheit 451 for the ADD generation.

Thank you. Seriously.

And X-Men is really just Roots Vol. 1-5. People are allowed to update old ideas.

I saw it more like a 'tribute' to the older detopian stuff than dumbed-down for a modern audience.

And I'll give them credit for having a good ending. 1984 had a good, brutal ending, but it didn't really show people how to beat the system. Obviously, Orwell's message was 'don't create that sort of a world in the first place'. I wouldn't say a downbeat ending was better/worse/the same as an upbeat ending, but it was nice that Equilibrium did something different.

I thought the ending, while very entertaining, was the worst part of the movie.

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He just killed everyone, quite easily, as if he could have done it at any point in time. Twenty or thirty guards wasn't a challenge? Shit, man, then why didn't you bother saving whatsherface from being fried? At least in the Matrix ending when Keanu goes nuts and beats the badguys, there was an epiphanic moment. In Equilibrium, he just got up and suddenly decided he'd been half-assing it when he was just killing two or three guys at a time earlier.

Honestly, I'm not really trying to bash the movie. I was able to look past most of that, and enjoy it for what it was. Good, fun, action movie, with plenty of the old ultra-violence.

I was refering more to the underground movement destroying the drug plants. But I see what you mean.

Just watched it finally (You all can stop bugging me about it).

I thought it was more like 1984 then F451. It would have been better if the fight scenes were more realistic and not trying to be a matrix rip off snooze fest (yeah, I said it).

I think that should be the quote on the cover instead of "Forget the Matrix"

Gun-Kata!

Worst part of the movie.

I liked the rest of the movie, its just the fight scenes I didn't care for.

Still haven't seen this...Every time I'm at the video shoppe and I think of it, I forget the title.

Tell them you want the movie where Sean Bean dies.

Heh.

Orwells message in 1984 was "oh my god I'm dying of a horrible disease so I'm gonna write the most depressing piece of shit ever created".

Winston wasn't dying, he was just suffering.

I wasn't talking about winston, I was talking about Orwell.

In Bean's defense, he's actually a good guy in this one!

...all eight minutes of film that he's in...

Has he ever lived all the way through a film?

I think the longest he's lasted was in Patriot Games. He died near the end of that one.

um...this is a short list...

Lady Chatterly (he also ran around naked for a while...that movie was a favorite for me and the girl's 'Saturday Nite Wine and Chocolate')

Black Beauty (okay, he was only in it for fifteen minutes)

The rest are listed on the 'Death By Cow' page. Those are the only two I can think of off the top of my head.

Isn't Lady Chatterly that soft core porno book you wanted me to read?

...did I recommend it? I can't remember.

The thing about Lady Chatterly is that the movie was actually better than the book. Lawrence wrote three different versions (two are incomplete, the third is what's read in college-level literature classes). And all three versions are different. I read the first two incomplete ones and didn't like the third version (she has another affair in it, which totally takes away the impact of her affair with the gamekeeper). The movie actually took all three versions and mixed them up, so what you get is a movie that's better than any one of the books.

And yeah, it's soft core porn. There's actually a 'phallic speech' or something in the middle of it. Quite funny, actually.

You recommended it to me in the "what are you reading" thread. Its on my reading list, I just haven't gotten to it yet.

The Sean Bean Lady Chatterly adaptation was not a film!
It was a tv series.

It might have been converted to a movie for DVD or international release, but it certainly was not a movie to start with!
Cant remember how many episodes there were, but it was probably only 2 or 3.

As for films he has not died in, I know he survived in When Saturday comes, and as he was in the sequels, I assume he didnt die in at least 2 LOTR films!

Death by Cow

Dude even dies in video games.

To get the thread somewhat back on topic....

I'm watching the commentary track and the the director explains how his movie is not a rip off of F-451, 1984 and other movies. He says F-451 is about McCarthyism (I say its about censorship but its basically the same theme) and 1984 is about socialism while his movie is about being numb and how the society in the movie don't want to feel anything anymore. Its actually a really good commentary track. If you have the DVD go listen to it now.

Shut up!

1984 is about uncontrolled fascism..not socialism. F-451 is not about Mccarthyism per se either..it is also about fascism. McCarthyism is a type of fascism.

Since we're talking literature...I think things can be a little more openminded.

Scholars argue that Big Brother either originated from the right or the left. I think people tend to think 'fascism', because Orwell himself preferred socialism.

That being said, I personally always thought Orwell left it ambigious on purpose, so the reader can draw his/her own conclusion.

And I've always thought The Crucible was the best Anti-McCarthyism piece out there.

I thought that the fascism in 1984 was from hyper conservative patriotic fascism brought on by the war.

Ronin?

Ronin?

Ronin?

Ronin?

Ronin?

Ronin?

Ronin?

Ronin?

Ronin?

Ronin?

Ronin?

Ronin?

Ronin?

Ronin?

Ronin?

Ronin?

Ronin?

Ronin?

Ronin?

Doubtful.