| Vantage Point (Single-Disc Edition) | 
 enlarge | Director: Pete Travis
Actors: Dennis Quaid, Matthew Fox, Forest Whitaker, Bruce Mcgill, Edgar Ramirez
Studio: Sony Pictures
Category: DVD
List Price: $28.96
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Avg. Customer Rating:  92 reviews
Sales Rank: 200
Format: Ac-3, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, Dvd-video, Subtitled, Widescreen, Ntsc
Languages: English (Original Language), English (Unknown), Cantonese (Subtitled), English (Subtitled), French (Subtitled), Korean (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled), French (Dubbed), Spanish (Dubbed)
Rating: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Running Time: 90 minutes
Number Of Items: 1
Aspect Ratio: 2.40:1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.3
Dimensions (in): 7.5 x 5.3 x 0.4
MPN: 21616
UPC: 043396216167
EAN: 0043396216167
ASIN: B0012QCZ5O
Theatrical Release Date: February 22, 2008
Release Date: July 1, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Amazon.com
Vantage Point, which aspires to be a cunningly twisted thriller, comes equipped with plenty of hurtling action, handheld camerawork, what-was-that? editing, and a plot that has multiple, contradictory agendas writhing like a nest of snakes. It's all set a-boil within a few blocks of a town square in Spain where a U.S. President is targeted for assassination. Although the movie lasts 90 minutes, the events it depicts are mostly over with in a quarter-hour or so--but seen, rewound, and reseen from half a dozen different (you guessed it) vantage points. The first line in the credits reads "Original Film," apparently the name of the production company. "Gimmick Movie" would be more accurate; the opening reel, effectively jolting, affords an initial overview of the events through the eyes, lenses, monitors, and dueling sensibilities of a TV news producer (Sigourney Weaver), her activist-minded reporter (Zoe Saldana) and crew. Everybody's in Salamanca (actually, Mexico City) for the start of an international conference to reaffirm Arab-Western commitment to the fight against terrorism. Terrorism, of course, sees this as an ideal moment to break out. As gunshots and explosions reduce everything to chaos, the clock is reset to zero and we proceed to revisit the scene as experienced by several Secret Service agents (namely Dennis Quaid and Matthew Fox), an American tourist with camcorder (Forest Whitaker), sundry locals--including three who may be caught up in a love triangle or a conspiracy or both--and even the President himself (William Hurt).
For a while, this is mildly diverting: that guy, or that gesture, so sinister when glimpsed across the plaza in one run-through, now appears harmless in close-up--or vice versa. But there's no real ambiguity (so stop with the careless comparisons to Kurosawa's Rashomon)--this is a shell game in which the peas aren't worth tracking. Despite decent actors, the characters might as well be holograms (although poor Forest Whitaker is saddled with "motivation" of surpassing sappiness), and the casting telegraphs several twists: one redoubtable good guy practically gives a wink-wink, nudge-nudge that he's really bad, etc. The movie declines to specify which nutjob philosophy the terrorists espouse, and their numbers are multi-ethnic. There's also a laborious suggestion that they have bloodthirsty, reactionary counterparts among the President's inner circle, which perhaps qualifies as redeeming socio-political comment and prompts a meaningless declaration of deep meaning from the Prez. The whole megilleh finally comes down to an extended car chase through impassably claustrophobic streets that would mark a lurch into unintentional self-parody--if only that point hadn't been passed a couple of rewinds earlier. --Richard T. Jameson
Stills from Vantage Point (click for larger image)
Product Description
During an historic counter-terrorism summit in Spain the President of the United States is struck down by an assassin's bullet. Eight strangers have a perfect view of the kill but what did they really see? As the minutes leading up to the fatal shot are replayed through the eyes of each eyewitness the reality of the assassination takes shape. But just when you think you know the answer the shattering final truth is revealed. VANTAGE POINT is a mindbending political action-thriller starring Dennis Quaid Matthew Fox Academy Award Winner Forest Whitaker (Best Actor 2006 The Last King of Scotland) with Sigourney Weaver and Academy Award winner William Hurt (Best Actor 1985 Kiss of the Spider Woman).System Requirements:Running Time: 90 minutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: ACTION/ADVENTURE/THRILLERS Rating: PG-13 UPC: 043396216167 Manufacturer No: 21616
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| Customer Reviews: Read 87 more reviews...
 Attn: Memory Recall Needed August 21, 2008
What an exciting movie! Reminded me of several past political flicks- elements from each combined in Vantage Point to make it an "end-of-your-seat thriller." I'd recommend to viewers to have extra patience when viewing this for the first time. The events are rewound several times in order for the viewer to understand whats happening. That's the simple way of saying without good memory recall a viewer might get lost in the crowd. I'd also class this film as one to use with certain rehab patients. Not joking here - often films have multiple uses as well as audiences. Another plus with "Advantage Point" is the involvement of citizen spectators during a national crisis, a reminder of 9/11. The tourist becomes a hero just because he/she was filming the surrounding as the fatal attack begins. Outstanding scenery, plots, characters, and more. However, in the end the movie was a close second to the ever popular "Dave", using a stand-in President as a cover for the real one. And it was a good move, too, since the stand-in was actually assassinated.
Lots to like. August 21, 2008
Yes, there is a lot to like about this movie. Big names playing small parts, and the reverse. Not a lot of acting but a good story line, and lots of things happening at once. At one point I was quite taken by surprise. It took me a bit of time to realize the importance of the replays but they're absolutely necessary to the theme as they provide the different "vantage point" of the title, which I found interesting and unique. Try it, I think you'll like it. I did.
 Misdirection Insurrection August 18, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Vantage Point was fun to watch. I thought that the way Director Pete Travis told the story was cool.
The first hour of the movie is basically a loop of the same action, but from various different perspectives, or Vantage Points, of several key players that witness a diabolical scheme to assassinate The President of the United States.
You may know already that one of my biggest pet peeves is spoilers. I hate spoilers. And I'm not about to write one out here so don't worry. But if you've ever seen the trailer for Vantage Point and then watch the movie, you'll be like, "why the heck did they give away that critical twist?" In fact, the trailer for this movie goes so far as to (deliberately) misdirect you into preconceiving who the bad guys are.
But why??? Did the director or producers think that their movie would be too obvious and predictable without the misdirection? I don't think it would have been. On the contrary, the misdirection made Vantage Point seem like it would be another one of the many government conspiracy theory movies. But it's not. And I think that the marketing of this movie contributed to its lackluster box office performance.
Dennis Quaid and Matthew Fox are great. Forest Whitaker's character is completely unbelievable...as in, it's hard to swallow a single action that Whitaker's character makes. William Hurt is The President, but seemed like he was in an Altered State.
All in all, I'd recommend catching this, but if you've got to choose, whatever your other choice is might top Vantage Point...from this perspective.
Coign of Vantage August 17, 2008
Fete of Death
I rather liked the thriller "Vantage Point." The repetition of the movie's story from the different points of view of the main characters affords the movie a nightmarish quality. It's like you have to keep reliving a nightmare over and over making it that much more hellish, the tension mounting with each reliving. You feel trapped with no escape. You know what's going to happen and there's nothing you can do about it. The strands of the plot come together plausibly when the ambulance careens toward the little girl on the street, and in the ensuing violence and car crashes the story is resolved satisfactorily.
 Highly contrived, inconsistent, uninvolving August 16, 2008
What one expects from such a movie is that some events are initially misinterpreted and that others assume increasing significance. However, here the inconsistencies, illogic and absurdities pile up at an annoying pace (see other reviews for examples). This prevented me from having any investment in the story.
The underlying sequence of events is not that substantial (in addition to painfully contrived). Consequently, the different vantage points have a disproportionate amount of repetition relative to the new information that is layered on. My reaction at the end was "Is that all there was?"
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