Vantage Point

Vantage Point (Dennis Quaid, Forest Whitaker, Matthew Fox, William Hurt, Sigourney Weaver) – This was close to be a unique, exciting thriller that keeps you on the edge of your seat.  Instead, Director Pete Travis outsmarts himself and turns this into an improbable chase-and-action movie that is more typical than topical.  The uniqueness of the film is that it tells the same story from several different people’s perspectives (get, it, different vantage points).  The central character is Thomas Barnes, Secret Service Agent (sounds like a TV show, doesn’t it?), played by Dennis Quaid.  A year earlier, Barnes “took a bullet” for the president, played adequately by Bill Hurt.  In his first assignment back, he is on presidential detail at a major gathering of the world’s leaders to sign a major peace accord in a huge public square in Spain amidst lost of protestors.  OK, why would the world’s leaders gather in a huge public place to sign something really controversial? What comes next is an assassination attempt on the president, then a bomb blast in the same square within a few minutes.  We see it first live from the Global News Network’s director’s (Sigourney Weaver) point of view; then from Barnes’ perspective; then from tourist Howard Lewis’ (Forest Whitaker’s) vantage point; then from the view of a security guard for the mayor of the town hosting the summit; then from the president’s perspective; then from the terrorists’ leader’s (I think the order is right). Great premise.  Lousy execution.  Indeed, Travis makes this exciting.  You will not be bored.  But at some point, as all the characters come together at the end through a series of coincidences and improbabilities, you want to throw up your hands and go “Come on already!”  This film is worth the time, but it could have been so much better if it didn’t just outsmart itself.