Genres

Visitors Review

tedg 2012-05-23 10:11:24

One of the Guys

An interesting way to see this box office failure is to consider therole of the US Navy rather than that of Hollywood. The film industrymakes these sort of stupid and expensive mistakes routinely. Themilitary has less room for tolerance, and when it goofs like this, itreally costs.The film supposedly cost $130M to make, but that was just the Hollywoodbill. When the Navy gets behind a film as it did here, it commitsbillions (many billions) in hardware and thousands of people. Therationale is that when these things work, they help recruiting. Beyondthe obvious, there is some serious thought given to how nationalnarratives can be woven to incite pride in providing military service,and how a suitably crafted professional armed forces supports domesticdemocracy.The way this works is that beyond making assets available, the Navyprovides script guidance (the thing has to support the goals) andtechnical advice. Both fail so miserably here that it gives us lessonsabout the W Bush management of narrative. (This is quite apart from anyqualms about glorifying military action.)The script has issues in this regard. Today, it is entirely believablethat you'll find attractive, kickass women competently flyingfront-line aircraft. But it is so demeaning to everyone in the militaryto cast her as the damsel in distress that is only rescued because shehas a lover in command. This is such a profound issue and it bears socentrally on the nature of the service that I am amazed at it. I canonly believe that Bush SES appointees believed that this was on pointwith the Boss's notion. I've seen how this works.More interesting to filmgoers will be the extrapolation of hardware. WBush military doctrine was to push for advanced weapon platformsalready in the pipeline. Practically, that meant pushing throughaircraft designed 15 years previously. As it happens, the managementsystems you use to design these things change 4 to five times moreslowly than technology does, so you are always making planes for thewrong mission using several generations older technology. There wereways around this, but not ones that interested the Bush Whitehouse.So the mission of the Navy advisors was to 1) push for the need fornext generation F/A aircraft 2) indicate the role for UCAV, one that isvery carefully defined to complement manned aircraft. At the time ofthis film, the extent to which thrust vectoring had been mastered wasstill classified, public stealth techniques still required strangeshapes. Pulsed detonation engine research is still hidden, and in 2004,Quantum Interaction computing techniques were just being considered.(This is different than quantum hardware.)Capable combat drones were suppressed in the Bush era (to help fund thelarge programs), and remotely piloted drones are a far cry fromautonomous swarming vehicles, but there was a shortlived serious effortin the latter.So they could have done a fantastic job on describing a future thatteen hardware geeks could have really dug into, both on the manned andunmanned side. They could have placed something really sexy in thecenter of the film and made it work as a film and as an attractivevision. But they were just... too... stupid. And Rob Cohen matchedthem.Sam Shepard plays Lear.Ted's Evaluation -- 1 of 3: You can find something better to do withthis part of your life.

Larry Ratliff 2012-05-22 23:37:26

Stealth breaks the astound barrier before you can say, 'Woo-hoo, that blew up real good!'

Jeffrey Bruner 2012-05-19 22:36:03

I know I'm your agent, babe, but I gotta come clean with you - maybe picking Stealth as your first movie after Ray wasn't a very good idea.

Bruce Westbrook 2012-05-19 06:30:53

Beyond mind-numbing explosions, Stealth's effects are good, especially the whooshing flight scenes. But as Eddie shows, humanity matters, and computer wizardry won't fill an empty plot.

Jules Brenner 2012-05-19 11:37:31

A premise with paltry propulsion.

majormadmax 2012-05-19 02:25:06

Painful...

"This was one of the biggest box office bombs of all time, losing atotal box office revenue of 58.1 million US dollars (135 million wasthe original budget for the film)." That in itself should tell youeverything you need to know about this film. If you haven't seen it,consider yourself lucky and go lock for something else at Blockbuster.If you happened across it on TV, then change the channel. If you are aglutton for punishment like I was, and like to see how you would dounder torture, then go ahead and watch it; but I will warn you thismovie makes 'Top Gun' look like 'The Right Stuff' in comparison.Maybe if you are a 6-to-10-yr-old who is a fan of 'Transformers' or area sexually-deprived individual who gets his excited by Jessica Biel,this film will have something that you are interested in. But if youare like the other 99.9% of the general population, this movie willhave you either bored or confused. There are plot holes that you coulddrive a Mac truck through. It's only redeeming quality would be it mustbe a real good laugh if you've been drinking heavily prior to watchingit; otherwise, it is well worth passing on.

2012-05-09 20:55:07

Best Michael Bay movie ever...wait, he didn't do this one? Oh.

You can obviously tell Stealth is a summer movie: it's big, loud and really dumb. You can tell the studio greenlit because they knew that many people, mainly men, would go see it in droves and why not? It's got fast moving planes, a hottie for one of the main characters and explosions. Of course the thing is with the film is that's ALL it has.3 pilots are chosen for their exceptional skills and they operate experimental planes called Talons. That is until they receive word they're going to get a 4th wingman only it's not the typical kind. It's an AI-like plane completely unmanned. And of course what happens? He goes haywire and things go very fast and very boom-y.The problem with the film is that it literally adds nothing new. Characters are not very developed, giving them just enough dialogue to at least stand out. In fact the plane, codenamed EDI, has probably more personality than they do but of course Jessica Biel looks hotter. It reminds me of Michael Bay movies where he tries to make us care about the characters and has moments where onscreen characters show their emotions and yet we didn't get the message apparently.Since it is a big loud action movie, of course it's quite exciting visually. While the flight scenes look obvious CGI, it's quite dynamic CGI. In fact this is probably the best aerial fighting footage that's been in cinema, only the cuts are so fast you can't tell what's going on(again a Michael Bay problem). Not to mention plot holes and conveniences like crazy: such as how come America isn't going to war with all the countries they manage to p*** off in the film? Or the fate of one character where we see something start to happen and then whoosh, nothing.If you're looking for a good action jolt, well Stealth's got it but it's the best action movie Michael Bay never directed. Or maybe he did and used Rob Cohen as an alias? Hm...maybe not.

badajoz-1 2012-05-09 07:46:59

Too many explosions - not enough SF

An interesting idea that does not have the courage of its convictions -eg an all-machine HAL-like fighter plane that begins to think foritself. Given the US's penchant for killing (assassinating throughmechanical state-sponsored terrorism) through drones it has aresonance, but the producers/director/writers saw otherwise, andwhenever the talking lasts longer than a minute there must be an actionexplosive to keep things moving!!!!! So the script is short changed,the acting perfunctory pouts, the CGI all-pervasive, and the storylinedisappears into the realms of unbelievable fantasy (yes, the hero andheroine actually get to walk through the heaviest militarised zone inthe world - the N/S Korean border!!!!!). Sam Shephard - are you shortof money - as the villain? Josh Lucas having to blow his one big chanceof stardom, while Jessica Biel gets an uplift bra and a blandness onscreen that is pathetic. Some of the production design and scenes arelifted from the film version of my late brother's novel 'Firefox' andthe final post-credit sequence is straight from the Borg or Terminator- Oh dear, oh dear, what a mess!!!!!!!!

Leeni-Maria Hovila 2012-05-09 00:51:57

What a bloody shame.

Be warned once more. This comment _is_ a spoiler.Rented this a couple of days ago. I still haven't recovered.No, it was not that good. In fact it was mostly annoying andpredictable, except for some rare, refreshing moments. We have thenecessary white guy, white girl and black guy, white guy is the acewith rough childhood and a smug smile which makes one want to kick histeeth in, white girl falls in love with him and vice versa, and theblack guy gets to die first.Then in comes EDI, *the* AI-pilot with enormous brain- or should I say,hard drive- capacity, getting hit buy a lightning (how very subtle) andthusly gaining what we might call the slight but oh so remarkabledifference between acting like a conscious* being and actually beingone, gaining among other things and, maybe the most important of themall, a free will, and of course, in the process, going as they say"haywire".And lo! for some brief, touching moment, it looks like the film reallyhas hit the mark! We have the first ever artificial _life form_, anewborn person with sudden concepts of "I", "self", "need", "want"..with the armament of a smallish nation. Do we? How can we know? Wheregoes the line between imitating life, imitating self, and actuallybeing one? If you are a monstrous computer mind in company of humanbeings, you quite quickly learn that "I" is a big word these days,whatever it means.Imagine an emotional Helen Keller. A creature comes into consciousnesswith things going on inside it that it has no words for. How do youeven begin to explain the concepts of "need", "want", "pleasure","frustration" "remorse" to a.. _him_ that may have all the dictionariesin the world in himself but five minutes ago did not know what it is toactually feel any of these in your.. silicon equivalent for "gut"?Confusion! Which he of course probably couldn't even name that.Morale? Responsibility? What the hell are those? How much can one learnfrom surrounding creatures- and how much of what one learns actuallydepends on those particular people from whom one draws example? Thisarmed-up-to-teeth thing just suddenly comes to with all these "higherfunctions"- or at least the potential for them- suddenly _there_, withno time to stop and figure out what it is that is going on, why, andwhat to do about it because no one ever told him, taught him or bloodywell programmed him to know.If emotions can exist in binary code, then can any moment of anyone'sbehavior in any mood be taken down to strings of 1 and 0? Thesequestions, of course, are being asked and, indeed, have for quite awhile been asked by brilliant minds. It is the fantasy of "my god! whatif we suddenly actually have the real thing in our hands?" which is waytoo delicious for imagination to ignore.EDI is set to learn from squad leader. Squad leader is a rogue. EDIgoes rogue. Now, for a Hollywood action film such a thing is almostpoetic in its small philosophical twist. EDI sets off to find targets."I am a war machine. War machine must have targets." How do you explainthings like "imagine" or "purely hypothetical" to a newborn machinemind which sets off to execute an erasing mission that doesn't, infact, exist? "If it isn't real then why is it implanted in my brain?"The possibilities! Machine mind is frustrated, it is sorry. It has nowords to express any of these, confusion can only be recognized in itsincapability to communicate in the situations in which it is.. feelingsomething.What is intelligence? If it is simply having a big mind then the supercomputer should have no trouble at all to learn to at least communicatewhat goes on in its suddenly self conscious existence.I don't know. I have been wrecking my brain on this, and what really,really pisses me off is that I feel so stupid just to wonder this.Because I know nothing of computers to begin with, let alone the theoryof artificial intelligence. Neither am I adept in the area ofphilosophy, which might enlighten the understanding of what in factself consciousness, an "I" concept, is, and what are emotions.And here, finally, is what enraged me about the movie. Suddenly theexistential questions are flushed. As if they never- ha ha- existed.The white guy takes EDI off to save the white girl who, accordingly,falls into his arms. The beautiful potential that is EDI goes "goodbye"and crashes himself on an enemy helicopter _forno-bloody-reason-at-all_. Except of course the possibility that heregretted what had done earlier, found existence simply too painful, orjust couldn't take the sight of the smug s-o-b getting the girl afterall (see former motivation) and committed, depending on previousmotivations, either sacrifice or suicide.None of this or these possibilities is, of course, communicated in anyway.Black guy gets buried in the sea. White guy and white chick have theirconclusive talk after the oh so touching funeral in which they finallyadmit their feelings for one another. (Though I must say I was slightlyamused my the white chick's saucy "Oh, just tell me you love me,pussy".) Not a single _bloody_ word of the first ever in our historyartificial *existence*, machine mind come into consciousness, with allof its questions left unanswered, all its beautiful growth potentialwasted, the end of its existence ignored in the light of the salvationof two hairless apes with six billion of a kind on this sorry planetanyway.What a bloody, bloody shame.Rest in peace, Tin Man. May the sequel do you more justice.

2012-05-08 18:32:45

Stealth never looked this good!

Let me just put this simply: 3D!I tested this BD on my PS3 via component cables to my 29" CRT TV, back to back with the DVD version. The result was very obvious. Although I didn't really see anything incredible when I played the BD, I was thoroughly suprised when I switched back to the DVD. I was asking where did all the colours go. I was asking why everything were so flat. I was asking if this is the power to BD. The contrast gave you a sense of depth to the picture, making everything 'pop-out' from the screen. The clarity were awesome and there were no artifacts anywere. The weakness? It looked so good that it looks fake. Welcome to the digital edge where everything is super-enhanced and nothing is organic anymore.On the sound front, the Dolby Digital track was exactly the same as the one on the DVD. The PS3 doesn't support PCM 5.1 via optical, so I couldn't test the Uncompressed PCM track.Other than that, there's nothing much to the BD. I only bought it because I wanted a title to compliment my X-Men III, which is good on sound, but bad on picture. Stealth is the title to test out BD picture quality if you ever needed one.

exciter-2 2012-05-05 10:26:20

Insulting to anyone's intelligence's. Total waste of time

I really don't like to comment on complete disasters, but this time itis an exception! This flick was not merely waste of time and money.This time it was a product - that has achieved pretty hard thing/ Ithas managed to insult my intelligence really deeply. i don't want mymoney back! But if I could - I would have made the producers to donatethe money I spent on the ticket - to US Navy hospital or some veteran'sorganization. This time one more thing I found pretty exotic/ Normally- if I don't like the movie I try to take in consideration the amountof effort, talent and soul - the production crew invests in the endresult - and I try to find it? see it etc. This time - I am failing -to find ONE frame? one line? one anything to praise! None at all! NADA!That was probably one of the worst scripts to EVER go on the bigscreen. Quinessential B-movie sans T@A (Jessica Beil is lovely - butover-trained and down right wrong for the part/ Come to think of it -everybody was wrong for their parts their) I am truly sorry - to writeand post such a thing - but somehow - now - I feel like screening -PEOPLE! Don't go to see that movie.

martinti 2012-05-05 01:11:03

I love Jets, Action and Computers...but this sucks!!!

I dreaded every moment of this dull, predictable crap. I laughed atloud at scenes where I told my wife what was going to happen before itdid... I was right every time!!! Also, this is the worst editing I haveseen since "Mantos!"The characters truly had no death to them, just cardboard cutouts withcomic book lines. I did not care if they lived or died. Love storiesthat went nowhere, and the plot twist was absolutely mind numbing.Side note, what was the 15 minutes of vacation crap all about?!I will just have to watch Clint Eastwood in Firefox, at least the endof that movie was good.

MaryAnn Johanson 2012-05-02 09:58:15

[A] hilariously absurd slice of American cheese...

meghan41289 2012-05-02 03:19:45

sweet movie

This movie is Super Excellent. Everybody should see this movie. IAbsolutely Love Stealth. Jamie Fox is so hot and good in this movie.Jessica Biel is great in this. The only bad thing was the way CharlesNdibe acted in this movie. Charles was really bad. A error in the moviewas that I was not in it because i am the best actor in the world aseverybody knows. But a good thing is that my uncle Josh Lucas was inthis. He probably played the hardest roll in this movie and didspectacular this part. The special effects in this movie were great.These effects caught you by surprise and made you say wow how did theymake that look so real.LOVE, meghan41289

dejfatman 2012-04-30 14:40:47

This means war

(Spoilers ahead)My brother in law must hate me, and I cannot let this pass. I mean, Imight have been able to let it go if his disdain for me had manifesteditself in a more civilized manner, like him sucker-punching me in theballs and calling my kids ugly. But no, his hatred for me runs so deep,he chose to exact his villainy upon me in the form of this hell-spawnstupidity know as Stealth. Each grating second of the film was like another twist of Lucifer'sfiery trident in my face. Hours after this holocaust was but a distantmemory to my TV screen, the horrific imagery was still burned in myretinas. I could still hear Satan's demonic host laughing at me, leadby my brother-in-law.Stealth, which easily charges past XXX and The Fast and The Furious inits unwavering quest to be the stupidest movie of all time, wasdirected by Rob Cohen, who, in exchange for fame, is obviously bound bysome unholy pact with the devil to assault all of his viewers' senses.And yes, I mean all my senses: this movie looked, sounded, felt,smelled, and even tasted like week old sushi. The movie's plot starts by introducing a trio of hotshot pilots whofight hard, play hard, and have perfect hair and teeth while doing it.You have Ben Gannon (Josh Lucas), the fearless leader who is wild,unpredictable, and doesn't like to follow orders, but, gosh dangit,he's the best darned pilot they have. Then there's his love interest,Kara Wade (Jessica Biel), a woman whose skills surpass most men's,especially when it comes to filling out a bikini. Last, and certainlyleast, is Token Blackguy (Jamie Foxx), the promiscuous, hip hoplistenin', basketball playin', and doomed-to-die comedic relief. After completing a dazzling training mission filled with enough fastcuts to induce a seizure, our trio is informed by the evil militarycommander that a fourth member, piloting a new prototype plane, willsoon join their group. But the new pilot is no ordinary pilot. No, it'sactually a computerized, talking Times Square New Year's Eve Ball! Andhis name, obviously ripped off some budding porn star, is "Extreme DeepInvader" or EDI for short. EDI is the heart of the military's latestand greatest weapon, the Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicle (UCAV). He wasalso designed and built by idiots, because instead of being programmedto behave methodically, predictably, and controllably in thebattlefield, he actually learns on the fly, picking up such usefulskills like how to download illegal MP3s on the internet.EDI is, of course, rushed into service during the hotshots' nextmission, and before you can say "HAL900", he gets struck by lightning,goes all "Skynet" on them, becoming sentient. Luckily, his programmersequipped him to display a graphical representation of a DNA doublehelix being split for just such an occasion.Soon afterward, the super team is scrambled to destroy some baddiesholed up in a castle in the middle-east before the arrival of some oxcarts bearing nukes (no, I'm not kidding). Despite orders telling himto stand down due to a high collateral damage assessment, EDI lights upthe terrorists, spreading radioactive dust over the whole region. Notsatisfied, EDI decides to off and kill several targets programmed inhis hypothetical war scenario system, thrusting the plot forward intothe man versus evil machine story. I could swear I heard my 3 year oldsay, "Saw that one coming." From this point, the movie leaves the land of popcorn-movie incongruityand spirals into complete and utter implausibility. I won't go into toomuch detail, but one of our heroes dies, one manages to invade Russianairspace, shooting down 2 Russian jets sent to defend their homeland(ensuring the start of WWIII), and the other somehow crashes down inNorth Korea, requiring a rescue attempt that murders dozens of NorthKorean border patrol. And what about evil EDI? What else; he develops aconscience and sacrifices himself for the team, supposedly leaving youwith a heart warming feeling. It left me with heartburn. The abominable movie closes with the typical happy Hollywood endingwhere Ben Gannon and Kara Wade exchange love vows. Ah, nothing liketrue love to help forget about the impending apocalypse they justushered in by invading Russia and North Korea. You know, there are many ways to creatively describe hate. But the bestone in this case, unfortunately, is not entirely my own. I couldn'thelp but think of one particular line in the cheesy dialog that, with alittle modification, could perfectly describe this movie. At one point,in charge of maintaining EDI's brain, our stereotypical computer geekwith bad hair, clothes, and, most likely odor, describes EDI as a"quantum sponge" that can learn at a geometric rate. Well, this movieis like a "quantum vacuum". The longer you watch, the more it sucks ata geometric rate.

dtoler-1 2012-04-29 15:37:34

Actually kind of cool

Stealth was not a thoughtful movie by any means. In fact, at times itwas just plain brainless. The "stealth" aircraft show no signs ofactually having stealth technology. It is set in the "near future", yetthe technology used is decades away, but still the Russians seem to beusing their old SU-27 jets? "Eddie" the AI plane was probably the mostdeveloped character.That said, it was a fun movie if you like to see cardboard actionheroes blowing things up in a predictable plot with amazing specialeffects. No surprises here, but it was still pretty fun to watch.6/10 for at least being entertaining, which is something that didn'thappen much in 2005.

My Word 2012-04-25 01:39:01

Lady luck has smiled on Rob Cohen twice now in a row now. Does he manage to score a hat trick with his latest offering "Stealth"?

In my review of "The Island" I stated my affection for director MichaelBay's work. He is one of the few directors who has been able to carve aniche for himself in the saturated and competitive summer actionblockbuster market. Sure he isn't the critics darling but what do theyknow about action movies and the average action fan? Straight up actionmovies are often tagged with the "only for the dumb" tag due to theirlack of narrative and wafer thin plots which merely provide an excusefor bigger, louder explosions. That's stating the obvious. However,sometimes that's exactly what the audiences crave.One of the champions of this genre is Rob Cohen.Cohen does not rely on fast paced MTV style editing to fuel his actionlike many of today's directors. To me he personifies the 80's actionfilmmaker. His movies share all the trademarks of that forgotten era -the big explosions, high (although comparatively reduced) body countand even come with their own monotonous action hero. In this case VinDiesel has proved to be a perfect substitute for the brute force ofSchwarzenegger and Stallone. Of course no 80's flick would've beencomplete without the one-liners ("I'll be back", "You're the disease,I'm the cure", "Yippie-kay-ya" just to quote a few) and Cohen nevermisses out on these no matter how laughable ("I live my life aquarter-mile at a time").Like many action directors Cohen has never been given the opportunityto make a "smart movie". You know the type - witty lines, smart script,engaging plot, quirky characters and a climax full of twists and turns.Instead he's been given the most conventional characters and situationsand yet lady luck has smiled on him twice now ("Fast and Furious" &"XXX"). Does he manage to score a hat trick with his latest offering"Stealth"? "Stealth" for the uninformed is pretty much once again an 80's moviegiven a new millennium update. Stuff like this could only happy in thatforgotten era. So I thought. A newly designed artificial intelligencefighter jet nicknamed EDI is the first of its kind. It is able to notonly fly by itself but also make critical decisions on its own. It isup to Lieutenant Ben Gannon (Josh Lucas) and his squad to teach theirnew squad mate some old tricks. Knowing that such a premise wouldn'tmake for very engaging cinema writer W.D. Richter throws in anotherfamous 80's plot device - the lightning strike. It is after this mishapthat EDI develops a personality of its own and is hell-bent ondestroying possibly the world. Can anyone say K.A.R.R.?

Michael Wilmington 2012-04-24 19:12:42

Stealth's strengths are obvious -- high-tech marvels and a good cast -- so are its flaws. At its worst moments, a mad robot seems to have taken over the movie, too.

pogo747 2012-04-23 03:55:24

lazy writing, uninspired dialog, nothing new

But what else can you expect from a Hollywood summer blockbuster but aformula production? Everything is so safe and risk-free here that wedon't really have much of any semblance of a good story. The plot islazy and rehashed from bits of other much beter movies, like Terminator(machines thinking on their own and taking over), Short Circuit(machine becomes nutty after a lighting strike), Top Gun, etc.If the Navy is smart enough to design a Stealth plane that flies on AI,wouldn't it be smart enough to make it lightning proof? Planes fly instorms all the time without incident (commerical, civilian, andmilitary planes). They're designed to survive that, just like if you'rein a car during a lightning storm, you won't be harmed. This is justsad, lazy writing (and already done by Short Circuit, among others).They couldn't come up with anything more inventive that lightningmaking the AI go nuts. I was able to forgive that for about half themovie. The second half just devolves into crap. Why does Hollywoodalways need a love story in action movies like this? Can't they thinkof another motivation for the characters? The second half of the movieis basically the same "big strong man must rescue hapless girl" type ofstory. It also features some of the worst-trained crappiest NorthKorean soldiers ever put on film.other gripes: Jamie Foxx is absolutely wasted in this role. JessicaBiel's cleavage didn't get enough screen time. Her ejection sequence isone of the worst-acted scenes I've seen in a while. And EDI downloadingALL the songs from the Internet?! (he must have awful taste, since heonly plays Incubus). Wow, talk about shoddy writing! Joe Morton and SamShepard are both good, however, even if they're in the same typecastroles they've done in other movies.Leave your brain at the door before you watch this. If you'd like topreserve the brain cells you have, stay away. This movie isn'thorrible, but it *is* hackneyed and goes over the same terrain dozensof movies before it has.

holdfile 2012-04-22 15:30:47

bless and thank you

Dear addgarlic, I missed Stealth when it was in the theaters and waslooking forward to seeing it on DVD. While I have never seen a badperformance by Joe Morton (and I didn't even expect him to be in thismovie), that doesn't mean he hasn't been in bad movies (such as thistechno-garbage).I was stunned at how bad/awful this movie was, but I found the wit andwisdom of your review very reassuring that what I found absurd andrevolting was not a product of my imagination or bias.Thank you. I look forward to blundering into more instances of yourinsight and humor.(Ooops. I just realized that it is not normal for someone to postpraise for someone else's comments. I am NOT being sarcastic or cynicalbut genuinely happy about benefiting from your insights.)