America Ultra Review
R: Language Throughout, Strong Graphic Violence, Drug Use, and Sexual Content
Lionsgate, Likely Story
1 hr and 37 Minutes
Cast: Jesse Eisenberg, Kristen Stewart. Topher Grace, Connie Britton,Walton Goggins, with Tony Hale, and John Leguizamo
Editor’s Note: This review was originally published during my adolescence. Outdated language might be seen in these old posts. Since then, my thoughts and values have grown. This review is being presented as they were originally written, grammatical errors, shitty sentence structure, and typos galore. Because to do otherwise would be that same as claiming these flaws never existed.
BACKSTORY: Sunday August 9th I go to a screening of American Ultra. That's it. That's exactly what happened. Nothing big nothing exciting, I just went.
STORYLINE: A stoner - who is in fact a government agent - is marked as a liability and targeted for extermination. But he's too well-trained and too high for them to handle.
REVIEW: Now approaching the dog days of summer studios tend to send out the shittiest piles of garbage nobody wants to see. With American Ultra being marketed as a stoner action comedy should be in that category just by description. Thanks to the charismatic cast especially Eisenberg and Stewart being paired up again (first time being Adventureland) puts a lot of oomph into the film. Writer Max Landis (best known for writing Chronicle) has written a rather inspired original screenplay that in the hands of another writer would been have sabotaged by nothing but drug jokes. In detailing of complex characters by dialouge, the film tries a lot and mostly succeeds especially when it makes a dramatic twist in the climax. Instantly when the film begins you get a sense of Mike and Phoebe's relationship and how much they tolerate each other which is pretty romantic if anything else. Even when you ask yourself "why is she with this idiot?" at times, the film cleverly answers that question without you seeing it coming. The film has a very strong setup that it makes you pumped for where the film goes. The writing is mainly everything that holds this movie together. The direction on the other hand makes everything else come crashing down. For an action film Nima Nourizadeh (Project X) does not handle the action scenes well. With nothing but quick shots that are too shaky to copy Edgar Wright tricks and too much slo mo that even Zack Snyder would call amateurish. The film boasts strong graphic violence, but it comes off cartoonish than gritty. Even most of the jokes that are funny on paper are delivered so flat that they come off often as chuckles or silence than laugh out loud.
LAST STATEMENT: With a great cast and clever script, America Ultra has so much potential, but it's rather sloppy direction prevents it from being more than what it could've been.
Rating: 3/5 | 60%
Super Scene; All lost in the supermarket
