Doom (2005)

By Leeview

I am all about movies based on video games ... Super Mario Bros.? the shit! Resident Evil? hell yeah! Final Fantasy: the spirits within? liquid awesomesauce and mere mention of the new Halo/Peter Jackson project makes me need a fresh pair of underwear ... but as with the good, there is also the bad, the Yang to the Yin ... and that is the BAD video game - movie translations, such as DOA, Mortal Kombat: Annihilation (the first one was gold) or House of the Dead.

and then there's Doom.

Based on the game of the same name that, along with Wolfenstein 3D, made the First Person Shooter what it is today, Doom is about a scientific research facility on Mars in which everything goes to hell ... quite literally.  I had very high hopes for this movie, its trailer was on regular rotation before it was released ... and yet once it was out i had to make 3 separate attempts to make it past the 15 minute mark ... lets see how I fare this time around.

The Characters in the movie are completely forgettable, with the exception of Reaper played by Karl Urban and a small performance by Dexter Fletcher even though his attempt at an American accent is god-awful.

Other than that the marines might as well have been named Monster Fodder #1, #2 and #3, i always consider it a bad sign when we need an audio/visual run trough of all the characters names, as they otherwise have no other identifiable traits *cough*Blackhawk down*cough*, Also, The Rock's portrayal of Sarge earned him a 2005 'Worst Actor' Razzie nomination ... 'nuff said right there

The special effects are hit and miss, most of them are impressive (the CGI ark travel, Pinky monster and the prosthetic effects on 'the imp' and 'the baron' monsters ), and yet some of them look so rushed they belong in the original 1993 video game (such as the steel door caving in in the opening scene)

The sets are passable, kind of repetitive and dimly lit, but that is 'Doom' all over, long industrial hallways filled with zombie-mutant-demons-from-hell ... thats what we paid to see! and the outdoor shots of  the barren martian landscape are convincing, although they're no 'Total Recall'

This movie gains major points from me in just one scene, my favourite sequence in the move that totally takes it from a bad movie to an awesomely bad movie - which is the First Person Shooter sequence, for those unfarmiliar with video games, it is  looking through the eyes of a character and seeing their weapon of choice being fired as they would see it, as if you were playing a video game and not watching a movie, it a great homage to the movies origins and is definitely nerdgasm inducing.

All in all, if you aren't expecting too much going in to this movie, its quite watchable, if you are going in to this movie wanting award winning screenwriting, go and rent Stranger than Fiction or The Royal Tennenbaums, but If you want mind numbing 'check your brain at the door' entertainment, this is the movie for you... with naked zombie women, a guy getting cut in half by a teleportation device, the best 'death in a dunny' scene since the sleazy Lawyer dude got eaten by the T-Rex in Jurassic Park and, of course, the BFG - Doom is  a tick in every box.