Bad daytime soap opera with superficial TV actors & actresses, no real plot, no character development, and your typical anti-Muslim perspective. All of the main actors are from TV-land and unable to rise up from that style of acting: heavy looks, long stares, punctilious walks towards the camera, histrionic dialogue. A combo CSI and Days of our Lives.
Dialogue is epigonic Mamet. "I know I'm right, but what if I'm not? Then we better pray". "We made a mistake. No it was my mistake." "I just bet my life on knowing the difference." There are just 4 alternating scenes, in no particular sequence: 1. Teletype-font subtitles appearing one character at a time with a staccato noise: "Situation room, NSA, Special Secret Bunker, Colorado"; "Kevin Farkas, Special Assistant Directing Manager for Counter-counter-terrorism"; "Ultra special really secret strategy session, Langley ...". This takes the place of any actual drama.
2. Dialogue-heavy emotional relationship scenes between two main characters that either explain the plot or an aspect of their relationship. Usually it's a long discussion of a relationship. This shows how human they are while they wait to see where the terrorists will next strike.
3. Meetings at huge conference tables, often with big TV screens in the background.
4. Short bursts of action around some plot point. Most of each scene is filler - the camera follows police through streets & corridors that add nothing to the story but do help to make up the 6-hour running time. Once someone reaches for a camera and is shot; later it's death over a cell phone. Two of the good guys snap and almost kill bad guys. But they later find time to talk about their motivations at great length.
I fell asleep for an hour or so during a conference room scene. I awoke in the middle of another. It hadn't made any sense before I fell asleep. I went back a few scenes and it was just the same thing.
There are 4 types of characters: 1. Young women (and 1-2 guys) who have impossibly risen to places of power in security agencies. They run the teams, make decisions, talk directly to the US president.
2. Haggard older women with scary makeup who run the agencies themselves.
3. Three good Muslims, one of whom manages to defend Muslims by saying "It would be like blaming Christians for the KKK." 4. Hordes of Muslim bad guys.
I suspect that the locus of the movie was "Let's make another anti-Muslim movie but with a twist: we'll have a couple of good Muslims; we'll show that the Saudis prosecute terrorists. But the head bad guy will of course spout a lot of Muslim rhetoric, utilize little kids, and murder randomly." My favorite scene is when the FBI guy explains how a character from Chechnya is actually a Muslim although though he's white - he even explains about the word Caucasian. So, yes, even white guys can be bad. And presumably black guys can be good.
If you watch a lot of TV and you like the neocons, you'll probably enjoy The Grid. And you'll probably remember that white Muslims are as bad as any other kind.
Dialogue is epigonic Mamet. "I know I'm right, but what if I'm not? Then we better pray". "We made a mistake. No it was my mistake." "I just bet my life on knowing the difference." There are just 4 alternating scenes, in no particular sequence: 1. Teletype-font subtitles appearing one character at a time with a staccato noise: "Situation room, NSA, Special Secret Bunker, Colorado"; "Kevin Farkas, Special Assistant Directing Manager for Counter-counter-terrorism"; "Ultra special really secret strategy session, Langley ...". This takes the place of any actual drama.
2. Dialogue-heavy emotional relationship scenes between two main characters that either explain the plot or an aspect of their relationship. Usually it's a long discussion of a relationship. This shows how human they are while they wait to see where the terrorists will next strike.
3. Meetings at huge conference tables, often with big TV screens in the background.
4. Short bursts of action around some plot point. Most of each scene is filler - the camera follows police through streets & corridors that add nothing to the story but do help to make up the 6-hour running time. Once someone reaches for a camera and is shot; later it's death over a cell phone. Two of the good guys snap and almost kill bad guys. But they later find time to talk about their motivations at great length.
I fell asleep for an hour or so during a conference room scene. I awoke in the middle of another. It hadn't made any sense before I fell asleep. I went back a few scenes and it was just the same thing.
There are 4 types of characters: 1. Young women (and 1-2 guys) who have impossibly risen to places of power in security agencies. They run the teams, make decisions, talk directly to the US president.
2. Haggard older women with scary makeup who run the agencies themselves.
3. Three good Muslims, one of whom manages to defend Muslims by saying "It would be like blaming Christians for the KKK." 4. Hordes of Muslim bad guys.
I suspect that the locus of the movie was "Let's make another anti-Muslim movie but with a twist: we'll have a couple of good Muslims; we'll show that the Saudis prosecute terrorists. But the head bad guy will of course spout a lot of Muslim rhetoric, utilize little kids, and murder randomly." My favorite scene is when the FBI guy explains how a character from Chechnya is actually a Muslim although though he's white - he even explains about the word Caucasian. So, yes, even white guys can be bad. And presumably black guys can be good.
If you watch a lot of TV and you like the neocons, you'll probably enjoy The Grid. And you'll probably remember that white Muslims are as bad as any other kind.