Rating of
2.5/4
Not great but good
Woodburger - wrote on 09/24/09
For a movie that was direct to DVD and features a non Hollywood cast I enjoyed this movie. Now it's not the greatest film in the world, I was able to figure out most of the plot about 20 minutes in, and I knew who the final candidate was going to be, I just wasn't quite clear on the entire premise of the test.
The acting is good, I have never taken Nick Cannon seriously but this movie is a move in the right direction for him. Playing a homeless man who is just trying to make some money he does a great job of utterly freaking out in the face of danger. In these types of thrillers you need to have the strong hero type who does all he can to fight, but having everyone get behind that role would be boring. They changed up the stereotypical thriller a few times.
This movie isn't amazing but it is pretty exciting and a little unsettling with out having to resort to huge action scenes or torture porn. I think the thriller/horror genre has been bastardized into Saw/Hostel type movies which just make you uncomfortable, they don't frighten you. The killing room does at least that.
At times it is a little...vocal on current issues, which of course drives the story in the end. I just have a personal problem with making a movie that is focused on 9/11 and terrorism, but it wasn't over done and it was vital to the story. From a writers stand point I would have made it less period based (in 20 years this movie will not mean as much as it does now) but it was an interesting take on psychological thrillers.
Some people are saying that they were upset by the fact that they used middle eastern voices/dialog and through in a "terrorist" angle to the tests but if you look back at any period in our history you will see movies that paint different societies and cultures in a bad light. Some of them are true and others not (such as Communists invading small town America and turning mothers against sons.) but terrorism is a hot issue right now. There are tons of WWI WWII and Vietnam war movies, I take no offense to this being based around Al Queda attacks.
