A good con game movie follows its own rules and, at least in retrospect, makes sense. Basic changes scenarios every 20 minutes and finally trips over itself.
Comment
03/27/03
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Basic (2003)
21
%
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:138
Fresh:29
Rotten:109
Average Rating:4.5/10
Consensus: Basic gets so needlessly convoluted in its plot twists that the viewer eventually loses interest.
Theatrical Release:Mar 28, 2003 Wide
Box Office: $26,536,120
Synopsis: John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson team up in BASIC, an action-packed military thriller from director John McTiernan (DIE HARD). Jackson plays Sergeant Nathan West, propagator of a harsh military... [More]
Starring: John Travolta, Samuel L. Jackson, Harry Connick, Taye Diggs
Director: John McTiernan
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Reviews for Basic
Top CriticBoth clumsily manipulative and implausible.
03/27/03
Top CriticIt relies on one of the most tiresome of movie conventions, the subjective flashback that exists just for the "gotcha!" when we find out that it was unreliable. By the final explanation, we really don't care any more which version is right.
03/27/03
The story soon degenerates into nonsense and ends in the kind of conspiracy that lazy writers believe to be shocking and surprising.
03/27/03
A military mystery that figures the more complex it gets, the more intrigued we'll be. It figures wrong.
03/27/03
'Things are not what they seem, because we're kind of making this up as we go along, without any semblance of logic or reason, in order to make you feel stupid.'
03/27/03
If we can't trust the narrators of the flashbacks, whom can we trust? Certainly not a director and screenwriter (James Vanderbilt) whose narrative approach is to repeatedly lay down a rug and pull it from under us.
03/27/03
Top CriticA Rashomon-like thriller that entertains and challenges you to pay attention, to figure out its plot and to connect its clues.
03/27/03
Moviegoers aren’t likely to be sold on the absurd plot twists doled out by screenwriter James Vanderbilt.
03/27/03
Most action movies these days forgo the script in favor of slam-bang visuals and stunts, but Basic actually suffers from too much plot.
03/27/03
When you get to the last Basic twist, I doubt you'll feel the movie played very fair with you, or that the situation makes much sense.
03/27/03
Top CriticThe film is so clumsily -- and often confusingly -- told that you find yourself working awfully hard to stay with it.
03/27/03
Top CriticNearly explodes from plot-twist overload.
03/27/03
I simply could not come up with a cohesive, untangled explanation to the jumbled whole.
03/27/03
The convoluted script provides so many twists and turns that it practically loses its audience. By the finale, you don’t remember who was supposed to be dead or alive, nor separate the good guys from the bad guys.
03/27/03
A flashy but flawed military thriller with more false endings than cast members.
03/27/03
You can't handle the truth! -- or more to the point, it's not worth the effort.
03/26/03
Top Critic...so full of cheap red herrings that watching it feels like gorging on a Long John Silver's all-you-can-eat buffet.
03/26/03
The picture feels far more dedicated to the proposition that a mystery can never have enough twists than it does to plausibility or dramatic integrity. But the teasing tale is told with such dispatch it will carry willing audiences along.
03/26/03
Top CriticHow many more chances must we give John Travolta?
03/26/03
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