Movie Review - Vantage Point

Over the weekend, I got out to the movies to see a film that had piqued my curiosity.  "Vantage Point" is a movie that centers around an assassination attempt on the President.  The title lends itself to the fact that movie examines the story from multiple perspectives, from an American tourist, to a terrorist, to the President himself.  Spoilers ahead.....

 

The film starts by showing the 23 minutes or so of action that the movie revolves around.  Then they rewind the scene and they start over, from a new perspective.  They continue to do this until you have a firm grasp on who the key players and what they did that brought them to this place. And once you have an idea on who everybody is, they start to expand the story and you see not only how all the players come together for the assassination attempt, but you see the different (and sometimes concurrent) paths that they take afterwards.

 

If you're a big fan of layers and details, you'll like this movie.  There's some big names in the movie (Susan Sarandon, Matthew Fox, Forest Whittaker, and Dennis Quaid), but they're all playing ensemble roles  The pacing of the movie is quick and there is a lot of attention paid to details.  I found myself comparing the various playbacks to see if certain details lined up (and they did).  And, there are some very unique twists that give the plot a little extra something over your run-of-the-mill action movies.  I'm giving this movie a "9," despite the fact there was no Indiana Jones trailer in front of it.