If you judge ‘Echelon Conspiracy’ as a straight-to-video knockoff amalgam of ‘Eagle Eye’ and the ‘Bourne’ films, you might just enjoy this moderate B-movie that coasts on comparably slick production values, a brisk pace and solid supporting work from Ving Rhames, Ed Burns and Martin Sheen.
Apparently cued up for a full-blown theatrical release, Paramount and Dark Castle came to their senses (once seeing the Spielberg-produced similarly-plotted ‘Eagle Eye’ beat ‘em out of the gate) and threw the film in a couple theaters this past Spring where its now finally found it’s rightful home in the unassuming, less expectant home vid market.
The film, scripted by newbie’s Michael Nitsberg and Kevin Elders, takes a few pages from 70s paranoid thrillers and the ‘Bourne’ films - along with just a touch of ‘Wargames.’ It centers on an everyman who gets himself entangled in what seems like massive political machinations only to discover that the whole world might be in danger and not necessarily at the hands of a human.
We first meet up with Max Peterson (Shane West) in Bangkok where he’s installing a security system and showing off his skills. Planning to head back home the next day, he receives a mysterious package at his hotel containing a cell-phone. When a text message pops up advising him to enjoy an extra day at the hotel for half price, he indulges, only to find out this text saved his life – the flight he was scheduled to leave out on crashed.
Clearly, the mysterious phone has been proven to know a thing or two so when it texts him to fly to Prague, he hops on the next flight. Once there, he gets instructions for a certain hotel and certain gambling and before you know it, he’s wiped the casino floor clean and attained the suspicion of the casino’s security head (Ed Burns).
Yet before Max gets busted by the casino, an FBI agent (Ving Rhames) rushes in and arrests him.
It seems Ed was a former agent, however, and shares a history with Ving so the two team up to try and crack the mystery of who is sending the all-knowing text messages and why Max was chosen to receive them.
With the head of the NSA, National Security Administration, (Martin Sheen) barking out orders, they come close to finding out the culprit before Sheen mysteriously pulls the plug on the investigation. Are the text messages being generated from our own government? And why?
Key is a plot that moves fast enough not to let you dwell on narrative holes and continuity errors and keeps the focus on the action, globe-trotting and moderately well-done chase and fight sequences. It obviously can’t compare with a big-budget title. When compared to other straight-to-vid fare, it’ll look like ‘Eagle Eye’ with the brains of ‘Three Days of a Condor’.
Competently led by Shane West (who probably won’t be replacing Matt Damon anytime soon), he has a few annoying acting traits but still fits the bill of goofy everyman quite nicely. Ed Burns and Ving Rhames do dependable work with Rhames even getting a few funny one-liners. Seasoned pros Martin Sheen and Jonathan Pryce also show up and make the most of small roles.
The film gets a 2.35:1 1080p AVC encode that does a nice job presenting the gray/greenish filters of the film with fine location footage of various European locales like Moscow and Prague.
Again, for what’s ostensibly a straight-to-vid flick, this is pretty slick. A Dolby True HD 5.1 track also gets the job done adding some oomph to the generous helping of action scenes. The film has no, I repeat no, special features. What, Shane West couldn’t set his chin down for a second and record a commentary?
I’m not going to go so far as to say this is a goof film, but this pic is surprisingly watchable and a step up from the usual offerings of DTV schlock - just don’t try to think about it too much. Sure, it all gets a bit silly by the end, but what good is a B-movie without a few eye-rolling laughs?
The high-def transfer is cool although the complete lack of extras might turn some off. Overall, I say rent it if you like B-movies and the comparable genre movies mentioned.
Echelon Conspiracy [Blu-ray] is now available at Amazon . Visit the DVD database for more information.
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