Customer Reviews

The Sentinel [Blu-ray]

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(36)
3 star:		(40)
2 star:		(17)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

Pete Garrison (Michael Douglas) has spent his whole life working for the Secret Service. He's risen through the ranks, and his current job is head of the First Lady's (Kim Basinger) security detail.

Complicating his life, he and the first lady have fallen in love and are having a secret affair. Someone has found out, however, and sent the incriminating pictures to Pete.

Meanwhile, Walter (Raynor Scheine), a former informant of Pete's, tells him someone is planning to kill the President (David Rasche). When the little intel that Walter was willing to part with proves true, the Secret Service springs into action. They have a mole in their department and need to find him or her before the murder takes place.

Unfortunately, the clues begin pointing to Pete. Internal investigator David Breckinridge (Kiefer Sutherland) is convinced Pete's the mole. Pete has no choice but to take off and find the truth himself. But can he do that without being arrested?

I'll admit, I was lured to see this movie based on TV advertisement placement. I am a huge fan of the show 24, and this movie looked like it could be similar. Plus it starred that show's Kiefer Sutherland.

Unfortunately, this movie didn't live up to my high expectations. The story is weak. Things came to the main characters, especially Pete, way too easily. I like seeing characters search for the information they need. Several pieces of information came so quickly, I had to guess how the character figured things out. That's hardly good story telling.

And don't even get me started on the climax. Several characters, including the villain, behave in completely illogical ways. Additionally, one plot thread is dropped, giving no resolution to that aspect of the story.

Since this is a thriller, I expected some tense moments. While I will admit to jumping a time or two, most of the time I wasn't pulled into the story. I cared about the characters, but the scenes that should have had me on the edge of my seat were rather ordinary.

The thing that works in this movie is the characters. The actors do a great job of making us care about what happens. Michael Douglas is in most every scene and does a fine job. Kiefer Sutherland gets to play the guy we're all hoping our hero can work around to save the day, a switch from his 24 character. He's up to the part. Not being a fan of Desperate Housewives, I hadn't seen Eva Longoria before, but she does a great job of playing the rookie caught between the two leads. Finally, Kim Basinger makes a great First Lady.

Another thing that sets this movie apart is the setting. Not only do we get great shots of Washington, DC, but we get to see the inside workings of the Secret Service, something I had no idea about. I found those parts of the movie fascinating. Additionally, several scenes take place in the country, and the settings are beautiful.

Honestly, this felt like half a movie, with scenes cut out from start to finish. I'm sure if I'd been able to see the whole movie, this would have been great. If you're interested, it's worth seeing, but wait for the DVD.

A mediocre, instantly forgettable espionage American government crime thriller, The Sentinel plays out more like a trumped-up network television show than a fully-fledged motion picture crime thriller. This fractured, overly convoluted tale of a spy within the Secret Service who is trying to assassinate the President is so laughable and implausible that you'll end up being cynically amused at most of what goes on.

The movie is totally dumb, and gets even dumber as it goes on. Michael Douglas - who indeed seems to be fighting the hands of time - plays Special Agent Pete Garrison. A few years back, he slept with the wife of his best friend and protégé, David Breckinridge (Kiefer Sutherland). Now he's having an affair with first lady Sarah Ballentine (Kim Basinger).

When Pete receives incriminating photos of himself and Sarah he realizes he's being blackmailed. At the same time he also learns that there's a "mole" working in the secret service plotting to assassinate the president. Things go really haywire when he realizes that someone's trying to frame him as the perpetrator.

Beaten into a corner and in danger of being charged with treason, Garrison goes on the run, partly in order to clear his name and also to hopefully uncover the real architects behind presidential assassination plot. But Breckinridge stays hot on his tale, chasing his former pal with the gorgeous rookie (Eva Longoria) who adds a bit of glamour to the chase. (Eva Longoria as a Secret Service Agent?).

Unfortunately The Sentinel doesn't really work that well. Apart from that fact that you can figure out whom the mole is after about twenty minutes, director Clark Johnson allows his pursuit scenes to run on for far too long. Most of the action is made up of a lot of gratuitous running, crouching, skulking around corners, aiming guns and shooting them. This of course gets a bit boring when carried on for so long.

Johnson uses jerky camera work to heighten suspense and to make the film look a little more prestigious that it really is, but this ends up being annoying instead. The same can be said about the film's overpowering background music as well as its choppy editing. And are the Secret Service really this efficient and on top of things in the real world? When you think of how the government has handled recent tragedies, something tells me they're not.

The Sentinel becomes even more preposterous as it lurches along. The rationale behind the assassination plot is murky at best. And then there's the big, hugely far-fetched shoot-out at the close, which suggests that infiltrating a small army of gunmen into an international assembly that is supposed to be a G8 summit must be the easiest thing in the world to do. It's also never really made that clear whom the gunmen actually are, but at least the scenes are shot in Toronto so we get to see some of the City.

The movie gradually sinks into a pit of conspiracy clichés, from the D.C. detective who talks like he's from a Manhattan borough to Pete's unkempt on-the-street informer who seems to know everything. Even worse, the characters lack in-depth development. It's also criminally sloppy writing when towards the end of the movie Sutherland's Breckinridge changes his attitude towards Garrison for the flimsiest of reasons.

The performances are pretty much what you see is what you get. Douglas goes through his usual tight-lipped shtick - you would think after thirty years in the business he'd be stretching himself and taking on more interesting roles. Sutherland does his TV show spiel and Longoria - who is never going to the world's greatest actress - is wasted in a role anybody could have phoned in. And Basinger looks svelte and gorgeous but offers little beyond her appearance as a meek and decorous First Lady. Mike Leonard September 06.

THE SENTINEL was, all in all, pretty run of the mill, unchallenging, forgettable and offered nothing more that what you could find in one single episode of the show 24.

The SENTINEL explores the life of a Presidential Secret Service Agent. When an off duty Secret Service Agent is gunned down outside his home, talk begins to circle about a plot to kill the President and a potential MOLE among the Secret Service. So, when SSA Pete Garrison (Michael Douglas) fails a polygraph, the heat is not far behind.

All sounds very intriguing, and it is, but the problem is with the delivery. Watching the film, it seemed like an entire season of 24 crammed into a 2 hour movie. There was SO MUCH going on. Bad guys. Possible bad guys. Moles. Possible moles. Affairs. Suspected Mole on the lamb. Informants. Assassins. A shoot out in a public place. Murders. Secrets. It all seemed too choppy.

The movie sort of has an empty feeling. People do heroic things, but they didn't grab my gut. Shocking things happen, but the movie is so hyperactive that you never truly get the desired feeling from it. Characters are established, but not really fleshed out... like Jill Marin (Eva Longoria). We meet her. We see how swift she is and why she has gotten this new job, but by the end of the film, we realize that she wasn't all that necessary cause she didn't do much.

But the main gripe I have is the lack of exploration and explantion given to the BRAINS behind the assassination plot. You never truly feel the danger from them because you don't know them. Why are they dangerous? Why are they doing what they're doing? There personalities are only highlighted but not given enough attention.

Finally, there are a couple of VERY questionable incidents involving the bad guys. Why would the assassin open fire in a crowded mall where everyone can see him? Not only that, but why would he instigate it? They didn't know who he was. What's he shopping for anyway? The second incident would give away too much of the ending, but the brains behind the operation seemed to leave his brain in the trunk when he got there.

Then of course, there was the cheesy 80s music ending. I was completely expecting Michael Douglas, as he walked away from the capital, to jump into the air, kick his heels together with glee which would be captured in freeze frame glory.

The SENTINEL could have been a good film. Kiefer Sutherland is his solid self, playing David Breckinridge, a variation of Jack Bauer from 24. Michael Douglas is real, sympathetic and solid. Yet, the rest of the characters are one dimensional, not unlike the story and the execution.

It's not a horrible way to spend a couple of hours, but had I spent money to see this at the movie theatre, I would have REALLY been disappointed. I expected more than what we got with the talent that was involved.

I cannot believe how many negative reviews this film actually received. Were they watching the same movie I was watching? I generally concider myself very critical when it comes to political thrillers such as "The Sentinel", so I am not going to just generally give such a movie of one of my favorite genres a high rating automatically without giving it some fore-thought. "The Sentinel" is everything that an intense, well-crafted political thriller should be. The acting is quite convincing and the suspense is riveting. I guarantee you will be pinned to the edge of your seat through the entire film and then some. Also, the scenario is extremely plausible, especially in today's world, with all the militant groups out there--from neo-Nazis to Islamic radicals--who would stop at nothing to make an assination attempt or terrorist attack against the President or some U.S. institution. My advice is, before listening to the negative rants of the other reviewers of this film, go ahead and take a look at it yourself. It's a safe bet that you will not be disappointed.

Here's the thing about "The Sentinel:" It is one of those movies you've seen a dozen times before in various incarnations, and often done better, but most often done worse. That this movie has a TV show, miniseries, direct-to-DVD, and/or decade-or-two-past feel to it is about the worst thing that can be said about it. Alas, that is all true. But there are other movies you could say the same about that, if I saw them bashed, I would go to the mat in defense of (anyone remember Wesley Snipes in the taunt, but underrated because of it generics thriller "Murder at 1600?").

Like the buddy cop thrillers, teen slasher movies, one man army flicks from Stallone and Schwarzenegger, and the Steven Seagal/Van Damme type action pics, Hollywood used to crank these political potboilers out in droves in the 80's and 90's. So it is only fitting that this film stars Michael Douglas, Kiefer Sutherland and Kim Basinger, since this movie is a product of their film-career heydays; not to mention they have all covered similar territory before in a number of films. The parts in this movie are a stretch for no one. Kiefer Sutherland does Jack Baur-lite, Michael Douglas wears a suit, beds the babe and spends the movie trying to figure out a lofty conspiracy and clear his name at the same time. Granted, Eva Langoria has never played a Secret Service agent to my knowledge, but then again she doesn't much play one here either. Still her presence is the one way that when we look back on this movie in 10 or 15 years, we won't confuse it for something that came out in 1993.

None of this makes "The Sentinel" bad, but it is a little disappointing that the makers didn't realize that their film was generic and try to do something to overcome the genre conventions. All of this plays out pretty much how you'd expect. No surprises or big twists. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for a tight, straightforward thriller, and "The Sentinel" isn't exactly predictable, but it's never particularly engaging. You want to see how it all ends up, but the outcome is like any other. Of course, it is possible the makers wanted to deliver more of a Secret Service procedural, and on that level, and on the general skill of the cast and director, "The Sentinel" earns a recommendation.

Here is a quote from the film critic at The Onion that sums up just what I was thinking after this movie: "Here's the problem facing the generic political thriller "The Sentinel:" Television is still free. As standards continue to rise and TV more readily turns out first-rate action serials, the bar has been raised for Hollywood cinema, and air-conditioning alone isn't its salvation. No one should know that better than Clark Johnson, a seasoned director of superior cop shows like "The Shield," and star Kiefer Sutherland, whose heads up one of TV's tensest hours in "24." For the most part, the professionals on both sides of the camera know how to deliver the goods: "The Sentinel" gets the job done, supplying a steady mix of action and intrigue without embarrassing itself too much. Yet any given episode of The Shield or 24 is more densely plotted, more surprising, and considerably deeper in characterization."

Well, that's pretty much what I just said, and that is pretty accurate. Even if you loved this movie, you should be able to admit to that. But again, if that's the worst that can be said about a movie, it's probably still worth checking out.

If you want to see a Secret Service thriller done right, Clint Eastwood's "In the Line of Fire" remains the high standard.

With approximately fifteen kazilion schmillion movies made in the past century, the question we as audience member must ask ourselves is, are we being too demanding if we expect originality in every new film? Hmmm... my answer? Yes and no. Who wants to watch something totally bizarre or un-life like simply because it's "different" or who wants to watch something so cookie-cutter we can almost quote it top to bottom simply from reading the back of DVD? Its a delicate balance. Do we make a movie that twists and turns, surprising but potentially confusing the viewer? OR do we stick with the good ol' tried and true recipe, a familar friend but potentially TOO familiar?

So where does The Sentinel fall? Well lets examine. We've got a president in trouble, we've got a high-profile afair, we've got two ex-best friend's having to work with and then against and then again with each other, we've got a hot rookie agent and we've got a mystery mole in the mix. If this doesn't ring any bells, I think its safe to consider yourself an absentee from the last several decades of cop/president/political films. But the pleasant surpise we get from this film is that, while it does ring bells, they probably won't start ringing till after you've left the theatre.
How did they pull THAT off? I can think of three reasons.

1) The Pre-Promo of the movie
A problem I have seen in the film industry is that, in promoting a film(interviews, articles, previews, clips,etc.), they sell more than whats there. But the problem with this method is that movies must suceed long after the teaser trailer to make good profit. Content matters, of course. So the tricky part is selling a movie that will appeal to the masses but not decieve them into thinking they're getting something different or better than what will actually happen on the screen. The Sentinel did this much better than ALOT of movies that have come out recently. The preview told you what the movie was about, who the movie was about and what the general genre and feel would be for the movie WITHOUT giving away several "extra" or "to-be-discovered" plot details. This really is a great assett. When I went in, I had a level of expectation that was easily met which made me able to just sit back and enjoy the movie and not think about what I THOUGHT about the movie till after it was done.

2) The Pacing
Bless the screenwriter for the script and dialogue. At every moment I thought it would get cheesy or drawn-out, there were usually just a couple words and then a change of scene. Occasionally, I can enjoy and be somewhat-inspired by a passionate soliliqy.... but typically, unless its a Shakespeare-written or beautiful person-given speech, I'm simply enduring it for sake of the rest of the movie. Here, the pace never goes so fast and furious that you need too long of a breather. On the other hand, its not at all halting. Whatever is happening is interesting and moves along. This tactic can save even a mediocre movie simply because it leaves you no time to get bored while not exhausting you.

3) The Actors
Truly, this is what makes or breaks the movie. Actors have the chance to really brighten a gosh-awful script or really sour a beautiful story. Believe me, it was no accident that Michael Douglas is in all but about thirty seconds of this movie(for an older actor, this guy has some serious stamina!). He IS his character, through and through and absolutely demands your attention when on screen. Brilliant actor. Sutherland was his typical terribly likable half-asleep self and Bassinger is, as always, solid. Longoria is ok. Her character seems like an after-thought and she's got the unmistakable TV-actor-aura about her but it was a good step into a potentially succesful movie career.

So there's the good. But, sadly, I've got two things against this movie that swings it from the 4-Star "Very Watchable" catagory to the 3-Star "Pretty Stinkin' Mediocre" catagory.

1) The Story
While its pretty fun when you're watching it, we all see whats coming for miles. Luckily, we're not set up to expect a huge twist but are rather drawn to focus on the drama of the characters or else the Mole would have been a bigger let down. The story line was familiar but pretty enjoyable all the way till the end when you start glancing around the theatre wondering, "Did we just get suckered into enjoying another repeat script from Hollywood?" Suddenly you recognize the characters for who they are... the faithful but flawed hero, the law-abiding agent and his hot pants assistant, the weepy first-lady, and, above all, the perfectly-underdevolped-but-familar, not-striking-but-averagely- handsome "bad guy".

2) The After Taste
The good thing is, this movie is fun to watch. The bad thing is, you won't want to watch it twice. And you won't really think about it again. And you won't really talk about it. Its good, but it's merely a 2006 film... 07 and on will know nothing of it.

This movie is certainly in the top percentile of its kind and I would reccomend it if I ever happen to think of it when talking about movies with people, which isn't likely. Enjoy the watch and then forget it. Not hard to do.

What were we talking about again?

Not a very plausible story. While the movie is entertaining the story line is not believable.

First of all the cast is great and the story line for the first 40 minutes is good. Then it seems the writer/director lost focus and the suspence faded and as if there was no real story anymore and it had to end quickly. I was quite disappointed.

If you are really bored and there is nothing on tv, then maybe watch it.

Michael Douglas is a top flight secret service agent who also happens to be having an affair with the first lady. When another agent is murdered, investigators played by Kiefer Sutherland and Eva Longoria are called in. They uncover a plot inside the secret service to kill the president and eventually the evidence leads to Douglas. The final act of the film is Douglas using his skills to elude the rest of the agents while he tries to prove his innocence.

The Sentinel is an enjoyable thriller, but not completely enthralling. The story is a little weak. The performances are good as these are all actors with a lot of experience. It's a good movie, but not a great one.

"The Sentinel" is an excellent thriller genre movie. Loads of action and a plot that doesn't completely slip into the absurd as is so often the case with modern movies.

Michael Douglas plays Secret Service agent Pete Garrison. He is having an affair with the US President's wife (Kim Basinger). This information comes to the attention of a group intent on killing the President. Garrison is suspended from the service when he fails a polygraph test although this test is not directly related to the affair. Garrison is simply collateral damage.

In the process of redeeming himself, Garrison is isolated and is seen as a threat to the service itself. He becomes a fugitive. He has no where to turn.

As the plot reaches its climax, Garrison's new understanding of events becomes the general knowledge. The real threat to the President is actually a mole within the service. Garrison emerges as a hero.

While the plot is formulaic, the action grips the viewer. Almost two hours seems to fly past as one is kept on the edge of one's seat. No, this movie will never win an Oscar for best film, but it is good escapism. Overall, a rewarding experience.