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Directed by: Kevin Bray Starring: The Rock; Johnny Knoxville; Neal McDonough Posting this because I just saw it today, great forum idea BTW. Walking Tall has the simplest plot imagineable, but it was a fun rear end-kicking guy-movie. Don't go expecting Shakespeare, it's not going to win any awards. The Rock seems to get better (more comfortable/natural) as he goes along, granted this role doesn't require much beyond what he's done for years rasslin. Johnny Knoxville is an only-slightly tempered version of his crazy self in this one, enjoyable comic relief naturally done by someone accustomed to being a clown. Personally, I enjoyed the no-compromise in Chris Vaughan's (The Rock) unwillingness to accept the "new order" of his hometown-gone-bad and his uncompromising crusade to "clean up the town." The fact that he preferred his 'Big Stick' to any firearm is tough-guy neato, but dissapointingly reminiscent of his character in "The Rundown." Bottom line, it's not something one NEEDS to see on the big screen. Good at a matinee's price. Cliches offset by well done fight scenes. Hot chick, but no breasts.
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May 2, 2004 06:12
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| # ? Apr 26, 2024 07:24 |
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I thought it was ok. Im not a big fan of "Revenge" movies, but I enjoyed this one. The Rock gives a decent performance and Johnny Knoxville isnt as annoying as he was in Men In Black 2. My only real complaint about this movie was that it was very short. They could have easily squeezed more story into it. Its a good for a mantinee or rental.
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May 2, 2004 06:20
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This movie had nothing on the original, but it was still pretty good. The only thing I found wrong with it was that it was SHORT. It's got the requisite action movie cliches, which I am ambivalent about. It's good clean rear end kicking fun for the whole family, since The Rock seems to enjoy making all-ages action and stressing morality somewhat, which is pretty cool. Check it out at a matinee showing, or when it comes to DVD. Oh yeah, and it's based on a true story (the original WAS the true story) so that's cool.
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May 3, 2004 23:01
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I got to see this movie in a 'mystery sneak preview'. Personally, I hated it: it's full of unbelievable characters (a top professional soldier whose life dream is working at a saw mill?) and situations (how the hell can someone wreck a casino and get off free?). Also, according to this movie, violence is fun and can solve every problem. But then again, I've never been a fan of this kind of movie. The production values are OK, The Rock is nice to look at even when you're not gay, and the pacing makes the almost overwhelming cliched vapidness less painful. I was still glad when it was over, though. 2.5.
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Jul 11, 2004 06:55
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It's no Rundown, but The Rock proves that he's not the weak link in his movies. So what's the weak link in this one? Well, there's no one huge problem but there's enough problems with the film that I can't give it a enthusiatic recommendation. First, as has already been pointed out, this film is loving short! You can see the movie execs greedily counting their stacks of tens as they boot you out of the theatre after 75 minutes. The short running time leads to most of the problems, mainly, not giving us enough background info to allow us to give a poo poo about any of the people being hurt by the criminals in town. Chris's blue collar buddies are fired onto the screen and dumped off as soon they serve their purpose. They never explain the problem his dad has with guns, which could have played into some real depth-building scenes for father AND son. They also rush through the jury's decision and the election for sheriff, if you overlook the obvious implausibilites there could be some great scenes with Rock and Knoxville campaigning. The romance is pretty awful, it really is just your standard, tacked-on action love subplot. The Rock seems likes he's only moving sideways in Hollywood, not forward, and that's a shame because he's got what it takes to be a good action star. Let's hope future roles are a better fit. 2.5/5, and I think I'm being generous here.
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Jul 11, 2004 08:01
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You could fit the script of this movie on a bar napkin, which isn't so bad I suppose, but nobody says anything worthwhile. Why cast The Rock if you're not going to get him to quip? Neil McDonough's character is a really tame antagonist. He's "evil" like that rear end in a top hat that talks on his cellphone in line at Wendy's and makes the server wait for him to finish. Also, they make the meth trade out to be some super-secret, unbreachable underground society, which is bullshit. In real life, the "meth trade" is a shirtless NASCAR fan with a chemistry set in his garage. Two.
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Jul 11, 2004 21:47
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Take the Rundown and remove the humor, exotic location, creative and exciting action, and enjoyable supporting characters (Walken) and you have Walking Tall. The Rundown had excellent action scenes that were wonderfully shot (actually some of the best I've seen in a long time). Walking Tall's action scenes are boring... only one guy ever actually hits the Rock during the major fights, and the rest of the time the fights are just: show the rock swinging his 4x4, cut to a wide shot of the guy flying across the room, cut back to the rock with a smile on his face. The plot in this movie is simultaneously stupid and incredibly fast. Before the halfway point: Rock returns to town from the army, gets beat up a bit in a football game, gets in a fight at a casino, goes to jail, has a trial, fires his lawyer, defends himself, gets found not guilty, runs for sheriff, gets elected, fires all the police except him (and his friend), finds his newphew ODing from crystal meth. They cram all of this plot into a movie that runs under 1 hour and 20 minutes. There's tons of  in this movie: The small logging town somehow supports a deluxe casino with a security staff of highly trained goons; the Rock (as sheriff) destroys a criminal's truck (in order to get information from him, he does so slowly... I guess it's some sort of property-torture); he fires all the police and hires only his former drug-addict friend (2 cops for an entire town); the local logging mill is surrounded by a large old growth forest; the logging mill is somehow magically reopened at the end of movie with no explanation...This entire movie is in a rush -- for example, when the Rock decides to shut down the drug business, his sidekick takes him through "drug school" (teaching him about the drug world). He goes from "let's investigate this" to arresting one of the drug dealers in about 15 seconds. When the Rock's recovering from his injuries, we're treated to a clipshow of him slowly recovering on his parent's couch (eventually doing push-ups). One of the few attempts at humor (?) happens when Knoxville is watching TV with him -- we can only see them, not the TV, and Knoxville is laughing hysterically at something (we never find out what). I don't know what the scene's purpose is, and it seems like something from a DVD extra / deleted scene. The entire movie seems like a summary. The Rundown set the Rock apart from the rest of the "new generation" of action heroes (he's the only one I can stand, really). Unfortunately Walking Tall has none of the originality and fun that The Rundown has, and is definitely a step down. I saw this solely on the basis of how good The Rundown was, but after Walking Tall, I'll be hesitant of blindly seeing the Rock's next movie. I want to see what they cut out of this movie. I mean, they can't have gone into this intending to make it just over an hour long, and since so many scenes are already confusing or incredibly stupid, I can't imagine what they deemed worthy for removal. 2.0 Bloated Pussy fucked around with this message at 04:43 on Jul 12, 2004 |
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Jul 12, 2004 04:37
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I saw this fresh off of renting The Rundown, which was the best action movie I had seen in a while. I thought "Huh, The Rundown was awesome, and this looks a bit like it, so maybe it'll be good." I was, of course, incredibly wrong. The things that really bothered me (aside from the common gripes listed by others before me) were the camera, the log fetish, and the lack of intimidating antagonists. There were so many worm's eye view shots of The Rock actually "walking tall," you feel shorter when you leave the theater. Secondly, The Rock's character exacts a goodly amount of justice, as can be expacted. The only problem is that ALL OF IT IS LOG JUSTICE. He has a succesful run of beating thugs with a plank of wood, so after being acquitted of said beating and retrieving said plank from evidence table, he fashions it into a slightly less plank shaped plank. It's kind of shaped like a giant, lumpy baseball bat. He loses it before the final fight with the "Yuppy Prick" bad guy, so what does he fight him with? That's right, a log. He picks a log up off the ground and fights him with it. This brings me to the final point: No one in that movie has even the slightest physical presence commanded by The Rock. You're just never afraid that The Rock is gonna lose, cause he's three times bigger than everybody, including the Yuppy Prick villain. They even used camera tricks to make Yuppy Prick look bigger, but it just wasn't happening. All in all, this movie could have been much, much better. I'm disappointed to see The Rock take a step back in quality from The Rundown. Hopefully this won't hurt his career, and hopefully his future endeavors will take better advantage of what he can do. Pros: The Rock is as charismatic as he is able to be given the material. Johnny Knoxville is fairly entertaining. Cons: The movie feels thrown together off the thunder of The Rundown. Short (not exactly a bad thing) Generally sucks. 1.5/5 SlimGoodbody fucked around with this message at 09:02 on Jul 12, 2004 |
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Jul 12, 2004 08:58
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Good fight scenes but way too short. 3/5
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Oct 9, 2004 05:00
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Actually, I really enjoyed this movie for what it was: A mindless action movie with a few bits of humor strewn about. The action parts are a-ok along with a standard run-of-the-mill action/revenge script. Johnny Knoxville has a pretty funny role in it to which makes it even better. Got nothing to do on a friday and got a bag of chips and some beer over? Give this movie a go. It's atleast NOT a waste of your time. Rated: 3.5
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Oct 13, 2004 20:36
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I really enjoyed this movie from start to finish. The Rock does a fine job in proving he's not just some gimmick on screen, he actually wants to be an actor. He has exceeded my expectations. This movie is fun and interesting from start to finish and I recommend it. 4.5
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Oct 16, 2004 13:50
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