I used to regard Mark Wahlberg as a not very talented overly muscular actor whose voice was too soft, but since I've become a fan of Entourage I feel a lot more kindly towards him (it's like he's my friend now, or something). Certainly he's managed career very well, with some excellent films. But, you know, watching him on screen... I still don't warm to him - he's too bland, lacks a strong voice and sense of genuine toughness - though again this is a clever career choice, playing a sniper who is set up by the government.
For the most part this is pretty enjoyable, with interesting stuff about the difficulties involved in sniping. It is familiar but it a skilled rehash - the opening scene has Wahlberg's partner talk about his fiancee just before he's killed for crying out loud (though they partly take the sting out of this by having the financee play an important role later on), there's an assassination, a betrayal. It's probably best not to approach this as a conspiracy thriller a la The Parallax View, which it has been called - it's not really spooky enough, not even X Files lite. Rather, it's an action film with conspiracy overtones.
The wheels fall off in the last half hour or so - it really should end on the mountain but there are two more sequences, and there is this awful clunky political message stuff. It's as if they had a functional slick script but then panicked about it just being an action film and shoved in all these lines about "haves" and "have nots" and conspiracies and "oh my goodness you're untouchable you're a US Senator" (as if Senators are untouchable). Michael Pena is likeable as the nerd audience surrogate character who helps super hero Wahlberg, and its great to see Ned Beatty back in a big Hollywood movie.
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