Low Budget

Movie Review: Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever

Movie: Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever
Director: Wych Kaosayanda
Starring: Antonio Banderas, Lucy Liu


I’ve never seen this movie all at once, but did see the last hour all together. Arguably I should see the whole thing as one unit to properly appreciate it as a piece of art. If you think that, let me know. I’m sure we can get you some help.
Before damning this movie, let me say a word about Lucy Lui. She is a babe. She is hotter than the top of an old-fashioned metal hood over a V-8 engine after a long high-speed run through a cloudless desert mid-day in July. Hollywood is full of hot babes, but Lucy Lui is also a true bad-ass.
Her glance can blast through more bad-guys than the Governator with an armload of impossibly heavy rapid-fire weapons blowing hot exploding lead everywhere. You can’t coach that. Hollywood has been searching for a bad-ass leading lady for some time now, yet Lucy Lui is just sitting there. She’s proven her mettle in Charlie’s Angels, Payback, and Kill Bill. She can be more steely-eyed than Jack Nicholson. But a lot better looking, and she can move convincingly.
Angelina Jolie? Halle Berry? Hot babes, even convincingly athletic. But neither is a true bad-ass. Lucy Liu, talk to your agent. However, she’s got to get into a real movie. Ecks v. Sever is bad action porn. No erotic tension, no sensual build-up, just things blowing up, guns being fired, and cars flipping. As in bad porn, there are no consequences to any of this action. Lucy Lui is able to mow down hundreds of men with bullets and bombs, yet never really hurts anyone who isn’t truly bad.
Even in all this wreckage, she looks good. Of course she never changes clothes, looking stylish and conspicuous, when perhaps she should be blending in. Still, who cares?
I think Antonio Banderas is in this movie too. He matters little, however. He is supposed to be a counterpoint to her badness, but is more of a sidelight. The plot is so numbingly awful that it was hard to figure out where he might fit, but he’s running around shooting things too. And blowing stuff up. The amount of stuff that gets blown up doesn’t relate at all to any tactical considerations. It’s like if the bass-player in your band suddenly decided he wanted to hear a whole lot more of himself. The special effects guys here have obviously watched a lot of movies where not enough stuff blew up. Let’s hope they’re happy now.

posted by dan @ 9/11/2005 11:11:00 AM