{"id":8110,"date":"2024-11-11T23:12:25","date_gmt":"2024-11-12T04:12:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=8110"},"modified":"2024-11-11T23:12:25","modified_gmt":"2024-11-12T04:12:25","slug":"xxx","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/11\/11\/xxx\/","title":{"rendered":"XXX"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"XXX<\/strong> (2002)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Columbia\/Action\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 124 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated PG-13 (violence, non-stop action sequences, sensuality, drug content, language)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Rob Cohen\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Rich Wilkes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Randy Edelman\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Dean Semler\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: August 9, 2002 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Vin Diesel, Asia Argento, Marton Csokas, Samuel L. Jackson, Michael Roof, Richy Muller, Werner Daehn, Petr Jakl, Jan Pavel Filipensky, Tom Everett, Danny Trejo, Thomas Ian Griffith, Eve, Leila Arcieri, William Hope.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: $141.2M (US)\/$277.4M (World)<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: **<\/p>\n

\u00a0By definition, action movies are usually silly and mindless. XXX<\/strong> is just dumb. It wants so badly to be the next James Bond franchise you can almost hear the martinis being shaken not stirred. I grew up watching Bond and belive me when I say the eponymous secret agent in XXX<\/strong> is no Bond. His real name is Xander Cage and he\u2019s played by Vin Diesel (The Fast and the Furious), an actor closer in form and spirit to Stallone and Schwarzenegger than Sean Connery, Roger Moore and Pierce Brosnan. They were suave, witty and charming. Diesel lumbers through XXX<\/strong> like a Neanderthal, grunting dialogue that doesn\u2019t include a single memorable one-liner.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The biggest difference between the two spies is that Cage is an extreme athlete. He does all sorts of crazy, dangerous stuff with motorcycles, cars, skis and parachutes. Extreme sports are his life. He\u2019s also a political activist of sorts. He steals and destroys a senator\u2019s car as an act of protest against his conservative views regarding rap music, video games and other fun things. It lands him in very hot water with the government. He\u2019ll go to jail for a very long time unless he agrees to help them. He\u2019s recruited by the NSA to infiltrate Anarchy 99, a gang of anarchists headed by Yorgi (Csokas, The Bourne Supremacy). They\u2019re in possession of a biochemical weapon known as \u201cSilent Night\u201d. Like all Eastern European villains, Yorgi is bent on world domination. If Cage, code named \u201cXXX\u201d for the big tattoo on the back of his neck, successfully completes his mission, his criminal record will be expunged.<\/p>\n

\u00a0It\u2019s clear to me director Rob Cohen (The Fast and the Furious) understands the mechanics of the secret agent genre. He knows the parts and how to assemble them. We\u2019ve already discussed the villain who just happens to have a secret underground lair from which he intends to launch his weapon of mass infection. Let\u2019s move onto the sexy hot girl. Every secret agent has to have at least one of those. Bond had one, sometimes more than one, in every movie. In XXX<\/strong>, it\u2019s Yelena, a bad ass babe played by Asia Argento (daughter of giallo maestro Dario). WOW, is she ever gorgeous! It\u2019s too bad Cohen doesn\u2019t give her more to do here.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Let\u2019s see, what else? There\u2019s the M-like handler Agent Gibbons (Jackson, Pulp Fiction). For some unknown reason, the left side of his face is burnt and scarred. You also need gadgets and somebody like Q to make them. Here, one Agent Shavers (the late Roof) outfits a GTO for our hero. Exotic locations? Check! The action takes place primarily in Prague. It\u2019s a beautiful city; Chen makes great use of it. Huge action set-pieces? Yep, in abundance! There\u2019s even a variation of the obligatory scene of the hero outrunning a fiery explosion. In XXX<\/strong>, our hero outskis an avalanche. Both things are equally believable by which I mean NOT! I know, it\u2019s pointless to describe anything that happens in an action flick as unbelievable. It\u2019s the nature of the beast. It\u2019s like saying a scorpion is poisonous or a cobra deadly. Big action movies will NEVER be known for their verisimilitude.<\/p>\n

\u00a0ANYWAY, XXX<\/strong> has all right parts in the right order. That\u2019s not the problem. The problem is that the movie is positively soulless. Like many an action movie with a huge budget, it\u2019s a rather hollow viewing experience. It\u2019s strictly a by-the-numbers affair except when it comes to presentation. In trying to update the genre for young 21st<\/sup> century audiences, Cohen turns it into a loud, lumbering, dumbed-down assault vehicle with none of the wit or intelligence of a James Bond movie. The villain is forgettable in that he\u2019s just like every other bad guy that crossed James Bond\u2019s path. He talks a lot. He tests his new weapon on the same lab rats that put it together. And so on.<\/p>\n

\u00a0As an action star, Diesel is pretty good. I like him as Dominic Toretto (the F&F franchise) and Riddick. Xander Cage isn\u2019t terribly interesting. He doesn\u2019t get off any good one-liners. Diesel tries but can only do much with what little the writer gives him to work with. Argento is nice to look at but that\u2019s it. Jackson basically plays the same character he plays in all his movies but without all the f-words (f*** you, PG-13).<\/p>\n

\u00a0I\u2019ll say this for XXX<\/strong>. It\u2019s competently made meaning that it looks good and the story makes sense. It\u2019s not overedited to the point of incoherence. The action scenes are well orchestrated, but not all that exciting. We\u2019ve been there and done that. It\u2019s a serviceable action movie. It doesn\u2019t exactly suck, but it\u2019s not good either. Watching it isn\u2019t a total waste of time but you\u2019ll wish you spent the two hours watching a better movie.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I remember the discussion I had with the usher (who was in his early 20s) as the end credits rolled. I nearly choked when he said Bond was obsolete and XXX<\/strong> is what young audiences wanted in 2002. First of all, if anybody is going to succeed Bond, it will be Jason Bourne. Coincidentally, the first Bourne movie, The Bourne Identity, opened only two months earlier. Second, James Bond will NEVER go out of style. This movies are classic.<\/p>\n

\u00a0XXX<\/strong>, on the other hand will NEVER be regarded as a classic. It won\u2019t die off though. The sequel, XXX: The Return of Xander Cage, opens in January 2017. Let\u2019s hope it\u2019s a better movie.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

XXX (2002)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Columbia\/Action\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 124 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated PG-13 (violence, non-stop action sequences, sensuality, drug content, language)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Rob Cohen\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Rich Wilkes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Randy Edelman\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Dean Semler\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: August 9, 2002 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Vin Diesel, Asia Argento, Marton Csokas, Samuel L. Jackson, Michael Roof, Richy Muller, Werner Daehn, Petr Jakl, Jan Pavel Filipensky, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8252,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8110","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-action-adventure"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/XXX-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8110","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8110"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8110\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8254,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8110\/revisions\/8254"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8252"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8110"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8110"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8110"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}