Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #5021 in DVD
• Released on: 2008-08-04
• Rating: Suitable for 12 years and over
• Format: PAL
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 86 minutes

Amazon.co.uk review

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 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 within fifteen minutes 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" might be more accurate. The opening reel, effectively jolting, affords an initial overview of the events through the eyes, lenses, monitors, and duelling sensibilities of a TV news producer (Sigourney Weaver), her activist-minded reporter (Zoe Saldana) and crew. Everybody’s in Salamanca 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 closeup--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

Synopsis
An attempt on the life of the president reveals a much larger conspiracy in this thriller starring Dennis Quaid, Matthew Fox, and Forest Whitaker. Vantage Point takes the point of view of five witnesses and shows them all to reveal the truth.

Customer Reviews

an engaging thriller but wont be to everyones liking
Vantage point follows the assassination of a presidential double and is shown through the perspectives of eight people. The film is essentially a jigsaw which you get a clearer picture of at the end even if it seems like a few pieces are still missing.

I've seen so many films I've lost count but vantage point's gimmick, what makes it stand out, if you will is the way in which its told. Through the perspectives of the characters we see the film twist and turn in rapid succession creating a multi-layered story of betrayal and terrorism this style appeals to me as the film spirals in unpredictable directions just when you think you've got it pegged. This style however is where the film receives the majority of its criticism for being repetitive, which to an extent it is, while this style will engage some people it will bore others.

Due to the rapid perspective switches few characters are developed and while the cast perform well in their parts they never excel,save perhaps Forest Whitaker.

Vantage point boils down to disposable entertainment, which requires a certain amount of suspension of disbelief at points an ultimately culminates with blistering car chase, not perfect by any means but worth seeing once if just to draw your own conclusions

Overall 7/10

Exciting technically proficient thriller with redundant emotional clout.
One of the stars of Vantage Point-Dennis Quaid - has described the film as a "Kind of Rashomon [1950] [Special Edition]" alluding to the films method of showing the same 23 minute loop of time from several different perspectives. Whoah there Dennis , don't get carried away . Structurally , though he kind of has a point though in terms of quality these two films while not chalk and cheese are definitely wildly varying qualities of cheddar.
Vantage Point takes place at an anti -terrorism summit in Salamanca ,Spain( though most of the film was actually shot in Mexico) where the American President Ashton ( William Hurt) is making a speech. He is shot , a bomb goes off , general chaos ensues as you would expect. We, the audience, then to see events from the differing empirical perspective of six different characters- Television news producer Rex Brooks ( Sigourney Weaver) , US secret service agents Thomas Barnes( Dennis Quaid ) and Kent Taylor( Matthew Fox) Spanish police officer Enrique( Eduardo Noriega) American tourist Howard Lewis( Forest Whittaker) the terrorists and the president himself.
As the differing viewpoints of events unfold we learn more about the characters and incremental details and nuances of the terrorist plot and its participants. Things we see from one persons viewpoint turn out to mean something else altogether when seen from another's. As the tangled machinations of the plot are gradually unfurled Vantage Point resorts increasingly into generic thriller mode with car chases( very well done mind) gun fights ( again well done) and lots of running around ( errrrr.....)
It,s very far fetched though but proficiently directed and well acted by the quality cast though Dennis Quaid looks to be suffering from severe heartburn throughout. I rather regretted the fact that writer Barry Levy chose to take the script into mawkish soap territory with Forest Whitaker's character undergoing some cathartic healing process through looking after a young Spanish girl. Cute though this is it does,nt belong in this film. Plus the redemptive feel good apple pie ending misjudges the tone of the film giving it a syrupy denouement that jars .
I,m also confused about what the film is trying ultimately to say. Is is that one event seen only from one perspective can never be as cut and dried as we are led to believe or that no matter how well you plan, determined terrorist( we never learn the cause they espouse in this film ) acts are impossible to prevent? Either way from my vantage point this is a technically clever and exciting film that has to rely on a cute little girl to give it some real heart which is where this plot fails.

It was a Good but not Great Thriller from my Vantage Point
The leaders of the world are meeting in a small Spanish town for a summit to iron out the details of an anti-terrorism treaty. Naturally, GNN (Global Network News) has a huge crew on the scene. The on the ground producer Rex Brooks (Sigourney Weaver) is trying to keep things running smoothly. Just as President Ashton (William Hurt) steps up to the stage, he is shot. As the jittery crowd begins to react, there is an explosion.

Back up to the beginning of the events. Two secret service agents (Dennis Quaid and Matthew Fox) are at the President's hotel. They accompany him to the town square and are standing on stage. Tom (Dennis Quaid) is convinced he saw something from an upstairs window. Just as other agents report it was just a fan, the President is shot. Tom quickly grabs the camera of a tourist in the crowd (Forest Whitaker) to see if he captured any pertinent information while the other agent tries to catch the shooter who they think was in a different window.

Back up to the beginning of the events....

They flip back and forth several times, each time giving us the events from a slightly different point of view and leaving us with another cliffhanger. Finally, they begin to show us how all these different points of view come together.

Sort of.

The movie starts out using the multiple points of view well. With each retelling of the events, we see a slightly different piece of the puzzle. How all these events fit together is left up in the air until the end.

But it's the end where the unique storytelling falls apart. While all of our main characters play a part in the climax, only we know how. I was a little disappointed with that because I was expecting all the characters to work together to find the solution. Instead, coincidence ruled the day.

I found the repetitive flashbacks interesting at first, but eventually annoying. It spends an hour on stuff we already know, just giving us a small bit of new information every time. But when we get beyond that, the pay off is worth it. The action isn't believable, but I was glued to my seat as the climax unfolded.

Here's a brief aside for you. Part of the background color of the movie is a bunch of anti-America protesters. That's fine. But twice as they panned across the crowd, I clearly saw a sign that had a W crossed out. The current US President has nothing to do with anything in the film. Either the producers just used some footage from a protest and didn't catch that or they were trying to sneak in a political statement. Which ever it was, I found it distracting.

Distractions and flaws aside, at the end of the film, I was really glad I saw this thriller.