Saw this today. Stunning.

Henry Cavill's turn here will completely overshadow whatever he does as Superman, he is beyond brilliant and has to be the front runner for Best Actor at this point in time. Bruce Willis has never been better, channeling John McClane and Harry Stamper into one mega character. Sigourney Weaver turns in her best performance since 'Aliens'. This is going to reach stratospheric levels at the box office, look for insane word of mouth and an unbelievably leggy run.

A+

Best film of the year.

At its best, The Cold Light of Day is a super generic action movie, the type of film which plays for a short while in auditorium number ten before becoming a TNT mainstay at 2:30am. At its worst, it is almost toxic.

Its foremost flaw: it has neither the joy nor the ace craftsmanship required to forgive its absolute unoriginality, from its liberal use of Tom Clancy style, neither-here-nor-there espionage lingo ("a special branch of the agency" and rogue operatives and such) to the fact a mysterious stolen briefcase lies at the heart of the plot. Yes, a stolen briefcase. The film also undercuts its own John-Q.Public-versus-super-spies angle when the protagonist, a Milquetoast executive on a nightmare vacation in Spain, too easily performs James Bond style heroics during the long, boring car chases and gunfights.

The plot at times resembles a second-rate novel for children and teenage readers, but cast with adults. Surprise, Your Dad's a Secret Agent could be the title, and there is another groan-inducing family twist around halfway through.

While there are a few neat (if self-conscious) shots throughout, other technical decisions are distracting and strange: much of the first act, for example, seems to have been (poorly) shot day for night, resulting in blue-tinted and under-lit visual confusion for the audience. Real, I presume, locations in Madrid and elsewhere are not utilized with any novelty or respect.

Though featured in every trailer and on every poster, Bruce Willis leaves 20 minutes in, no doubt paid far too much for this exhausted, minor, and unpleasant performance. One senses the other actors wish they could follow him out the door. This film's failure is almost fascinating: spies are fun. Chases through European cities are fun. Protagonists in over their heads and forced to be resourceful are fun. So why is there almost no fun to be found here? What went so wrong? Maybe the answer is inside the briefcase.

D

I voted C by accident.

You can change your vote.

How?

Umm...just by doing it.



Glad you disliked it. I was afraid your liking of Cavill would blur your perception.

Only interesting thing - the girl turned out to be the sister and not a love interest for a change.

This poll doesn't allow repeat voting, at least not for me.

Well, it does for me, so I'm not sure what the problem is.

Maybe because you and the good doctor are administrators.

Yeah, I agree, that actually surprised me.

Yeah, it was pretty bad but I didn't mind staring at Cavill.

I caught this on tv, and after having seen a slew of mostly great films, this really put me back on earth to realize there are bad movies out there. I want to take away a few good things from this, I like Cavill in it and his spanish female associate too, also the car chase scene at the end is reasonably choreographed, but everything else is pretty ugh, from Willis to Weaver, the action, the plot it's all so very dull and it feels like a completely useless film for most of it.

D+