Yes, I admit it. I really like watching Doug Liman's Jumper, the 2008 critically panned sci-fi movie featuring Diane Lane, Hayden Christensen , and the ubiquitous Samuel L. Jackson.
Honestly? The movie pretty much sucked. Let's get that out right away. Special effects aside, the storyline really needed a lot of work. Oh wait...did you know it was based on a book?
A book so bad-ass, it basically should have been the storyline. The writers of Hollywood, in their status of knowing it all, decided that Steven Gould's novel needed spicing up and to be a convoluted confusing mass of "Why the heck did that happen?".
So why do I watch movie? Because I often find myself in a realm of Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda. The books, if you haven't read them ,really develop that thing called character. Yeah, I know; it's just not a pretty thing on screen. It's not like it's never been done before [cough Forrest Gump cough ] or has ever been successful [cough Bourne Identity cough], but what do I know?
The best part of the books? The sequel was equally good. Yeah, it was. What the movie lacked, the book easily addressed. The action of "jumping" was overplayed, in the thought that audiences would be swayed by magically disappearing and reappearing. Ask yourself this: Why are the Harry Potter and Twilight series so successful? The development of the characters. The movies themselves were easily written; they followed the original blueprint!
On second thought, don't watch the movie. It will basically piss you off and you'll rant to me about losing ninety minutes of your life. Spend a few hours and read Steven Gould's little gems about a young man against the world and how he/it is changed through the course of events.
If you watch the movie, you will feel guilty. I can't attest to any pleasure though.
Shazam!
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