Max Payne or Max Fail?

Before I go into detail with my review of Max Payne, I'd like to say a few words about Dead Space! If you haven't tried it yet, do so now! Actually try it at night with surround sound and by yourself. If you don't get surprised at all then, you aren't human! Here's a senario (spoiler alert-sorta, skip to the next paragraph) that I witnessed while playing the game. An enemy came threw a broken vent in the side and attacked me. I shot it a couple times until it went back in the vents it came threw. I said, "Alright, maybe it's a scripted event that I wasn't suppose to kill it". Wrong was I! As I was walking away, the enemy came back threw and attacked me from behind! I ended up finishing him but it's moments like these that really make the game interesting and scary.



The game's enemy design are awesome because the "hyped" body dismemberment mechanic is amazing. You shoot a enemy in the leg, they fall down and drag their body towards you! I also think you should definitely check out the animated comic before playing the game. It tells you about how everything went to hell and then some.


[ Movie Review of Max Payne ]
Trailer:


Why is it that video game movies never turn out as good as you'd expect? Also, why did the director choose not to create a movie for the gaming audience instead of mixing the two? This is the main downfall for the movie and which I hated it for it. Here are some of the thoughts that went through my head while watching it:

" Where is the Max Payne that always takes painkillers? Why are the other side characters always talking? Mark Wahlberg is badass and looks like Max Payne. WTF, why is Ludacris a cop? Why did it take so long to get the killing? I want more killing! I should probably refill my soda (pop to the people that call soda, pop). I want more slow motion sequences! The main enemy got taken out from one shot, wtf? "

If you played the game, you'll be saying the same things. The movie suffers from trying to hard to get the causal audience and the gaming audience to like the movie. It ends up into a movie that they both won't like and is another video game movie gone bad. Seeing the trailer, I thought this was going to be a mix between the movie "Shoot'em Up" with the Max Payne story line. Man, was I wrong! If you were expecting a action packed movie, you aren't going to find it here. Another thing that bugged me was all these side characters talking. I try and think back what made Max Payne the game, Max Payne the game. I remembered the beginning comics that made the intro cut scene to every level. It had Max Payne talking to himself about the situation. Here's a video to help remind you if you forgot.

Beginning cut scene to Max Payne:


This isn't used at all in the movie and it is a shame. Instead, you hear from boring characters that you forget within seconds. That said, you don't fall into the world of Max Payne, you fall into a generic city. I don't know about you but I remember the game having tons of drug addicts, strippers, and crooked cops chasing him. The movie doesn't even have enough of these to satisfy that!

It's not all bad though. Mark Wahlberg's performance is like in every other movie, amazing. He really sets himself to look and act like Max Payne. The effects of the movie can be just amazing at times. The city's weather is always changing from snowy and night to sunny and bright. It seemed to me that they were trying to make it seem like Max Payne never knew what time of the day it was. It is moments like that that are really cool. The sad part of it all is that these positives don't save the movie from the disappointment it is.

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C-
Pros: Mark Wahlberg is Max Payne, cool effects from weather to gun shots
Cons: Everything else. It tries to hard to be mix the mainstream audience with the gaming audience and just fails at it.