Customer Reviews

XIII - The Conspiracy [Blu-Ray]

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Make no mistake about it, this film is almost entirely patterned after the Bourne series. But with that being said, there are more than a few reasons why you should check it out.

Stephen Dorff plays XIII, the lethal one-man army who wakes up with a bullet hole and amnesia. He enlists the help of a beautiful European woman, while getting the occasional flashback of his past. Sound familiar yet? What sets this movie apart from the Bourne series are several conspiracy angles, and to its credit, the film keeps you fairly entertained.

The good: The editing is terrific. Yann Hervé cuts the movie in a similar style that you'd see in Tony Scott flicks like Man on Fire. Coincidentally, composer Nicolas Errèra puts together a nice score that's reminiscent of Scott's film Deja Vu. Director Duane Clark earned his stripes shooting countless episodes of CSI, and does a solid job with XIII. While I thought Stephen Dorff was miscast in Felon, his previous film with Val Kilmer, I was happy with his work as XIII.

The bad: Expect plot holes, and some laughingly implausible scenes, starting with the stunning Italian actress Caterina Murinos noticing XIII's collarbone tattoo. As this was a TV miniseries, the fight choreography isn't as good as the Bourne series. Val Kilmer, the king of straight to video Redbox flicks, offers a completely forgettable performance as the mysterious Mongoose. Which is also a good thing, considering he gets only 10 minutes of screen time throughout the entire film.

This was shot for TV, it was never meant to be a blockbuster film. So with that in mind, if you can get past the fact that it's a Jason Bourne hijack, you'll actually find this movie entertaining. I was honestly surprised, definitely give this one a watch.

I do not know of the story/video game original stuff, so I went into this hoping I would see a solid suspense series as it was advertised to us. It felt like a mix of Nowhere Man - The Complete Series meets 24, meets a longer (and worse version) of Blind Horizon. Val Kilmer is in the latter film I mentioned, with Dorff playing Val's role in this series, and after spending three nauseating hours of XIII, I have to recommend the older film.

The story follows an amnesia laden agent (Dorff) as he uncovers a vast conspiracy around an assassination of the US President, of which he is blamed for but cannot recall. Val Kilmer plays the bad guy who finds fifteen different ways in three hours to botch killing our hero. As the story progresses, we are treated to multiple jumpy-editing flashbacks that are as irritating as I have encountered (usually after each fade-to-black that would have been an ad). I timed roughly 10-15 minutes of flashy/jumpy filler from beginning to end. The story is rife with mistakes, plot holes and cliches, but it will maintain a decent level of entertainment for some.

The Blu clarity is a mixed bag, as there are plenty of scenes with intentional grain, bad focusing, and bland colorings. The 5.1 is average throughout, with one or two reference points. The special features last 67 minutes and include behind the scenes on special effects, stunts, and interviews of Dorff and Kilmer. The entire hour is so mismanaged I cannot stress enough how this would be a waste of your time. The only two explanations I can come up with regarding Kilmer's interview on set, was that he was either intoxicated or he was deliberately messing with the crew to throw them off (he has to look around to remember what scene they are filming, then he describes the wrong scene, stops talking mid sentence and stares off into space, etc.). On Dorff's interview the opening question goes contrary to what the interviewer asked as Dorff became irritated with him. The point being, they should have re-shot that entire half hour into an actual professional looking supplement. The behind the scenes camera guy was mimicking the production as he never holds still so it gets old fast.

I always enjoy watching Stephen McHattie (one of the leads from the Jesse Stone films), and Dorff is convincing. The amount of flubs, yeah-right moments and editing/filming styles make for a long watch, but there are a few highlights scattered throughout to keep the masses entertained. English and French language, no subs, region coded A. Maybe a rental recommendation, but not much purchase value.

The saying, "If you can't beat them, join them" used to be an homage to the power and majesty of a phenomenon. In "13: The Conspiracy," it is the boilerplate for Pop Culture. Instead of "13..." being influenced by The Bourne Trilogy, "24" and "Shooter," it takes pieces of each concept and attempts to fuse them into a flawless synchronous film without anyone noticing the plagiarism. This movie turns Pablo Picasso's dictum "Good artists copy, great artists steal" on its head. By stealing from the better of the action genre, "13: The Conspiracy" bombs.

The influence of one movie on another should never be so blatant as to remind and compare the knock-off to the original. Not only does remembrance promote a competitive product, it raises the expectations of the knock-off. Although "13..."keeps the interest of the audience, if offends the intellect.

"13: The Conspiracy" offends the intellect of action movie connoisseurs, but gets you through the night if you don't have anything else better to do.

Edward Brown
Core Edge Image & Charisma Institute

I am stunned at the many 4 and 5 star reviews for this tragically stupid movie. While the movie did contain a number of bright spots -- specifically the filming, editing, music, and acting -- these elements alone will not float a movie to success. I could even forgive the blatant rip-off of the Bourne Identify series if the story itself was okay, but, alas, no dice. The action sequences are decent and the main actor, Stephen Dorff did a superb job considering the horrid dialog he was presented with. Val Kilmer is in the movie for maybe 10 minutes, so don't expect much from him. The plot reads like something a 5th grader put together with help from MSNBC's Keith Olberman (only not funny). Essentially, (spoilers beware -- though if you watch the first 5 minutes of the movie, you pretty much know all this already), the first female president is shot by a sniper while she is presenting her plan to bring the troops home from Iraq and Afghanistan... Then it turns out that this is all part of a larger government conspiracy planned by the evil republican GOP to bring the government to their knees and basically enslave the human race. Now don't get me wrong -- I am no George W. Bush fan. I am also a veteran of the war in Afghanistan, so I have some idea about how the military and government works. I could even support a movie that presented an intelligent conspiracy with the military/republicans as the bad guys, if it was done realistically or plausibly. This movie, on the other hand, would have you believe that every person with any conservative leaning is a neo-Nazi seeking to recreate the government into Hitler's vision of a new race. To make up for all the plot holes, the movie jams in sequences where various people suddenly find themselves spending 5 minutes explaining what the hell is going on to you, the audience. These sequences are so laughable and obvious, it becomes difficult to stay even mildly entertained. Even the action sequences suffer from stupidity. (like one scene when both Kilmer and Dorff somehow lose their handguns and proceed to duke it out for a bit before finding random pieces of glass that just so happen to have broken into 3 inch wide by 3 feet long sword shaped pieces. They then pick up these "glass swords" and have a sword fight. Seriously.)

Bottom line: if you absolutely hate republicans and think they all work for Nazis, enjoy very bad dialogue, long-winded movies with overly complicated plots designed to make up for the movie's own shortcomings, then by all means, buy this movie stat. Otherwise, save your money and just buy or rent the Bourne Identity.

I look at movie based on how it is not off if it copys another movie or same story line. I think this was one of the best movie make this year. kept me on my seat the whole movie.. i dont know if there is a second movie out alread but if there is let me know..

This is fashioned after The jean Van Hemme comic series. And that was lifted from a book but embellished into separate issues. Bourne flix work the same story. This version suffers from TV ism which is too bad because Dorff makes a strong Xlll and people are pretty good overall. But the shots are wrong. Just poor cinematography which makes everything flat & overall predictable. The sequencing is low key, with no tension. The weird sepia tones add ziltch to the story. That was sort of a fad to make everything brown. All the same. Doesn't do much when you want to build suspense. Scenes don't end making a statement but jerk into the next one. It gives the plot away twice killing any chance at suspence. That is just poor scripting. But you get the idea which is a good one and could be great if only...

I don't know what movie the previous reviewer watched, but it didn't seem like the one I just watched. I thought it was pretty good. Evidently is was a TV mini series in 2008. Don't know how I missed it back when. I would have prefered it wasn't a made for TV flick cause then it would not have to have went through the censors. The language could have been more lively if you know what I mean, a little less TVish.

After watching the amazing "Felon" with Val Kilmer and Stephen Dorf, I was really looking forward to this movie.

But this movie is horrible. It is comprised of very bad acting and all the cliches in the Hollywood scriptwriting book. Horrible.

It's a great movie full of action and suspense... and is nice to find a movie with action that is not full of cursing and sex... if you like the bourne movies you'll like this...

No subtitle (I have never seen a DVD or blu-ray wothout English subtitle !!) .
Terrible for non-American.
Sould be noted before sale !!