Review of Snake Eyes (1998) by Stephanie A — 01 Oct 2009

I'm not a great fan of Brian DePlama at all. In my opinion Scarface is vastly over-rated with a few great innovative moments thinly spread throughout an overly long and actually quite uninspired script. With Snake Eyes, DePalma has a similar problem.

The set up is great, an intricate single shot which lasts from the start of the film until an assasination on a leading government figure takes place is very impressive and really manages to build up a very realistic bustling atmosphere around the match. Afterwards however, the film deteriorates into a very cheesy action thriller that chooses clever camerawork over a clever script.

I am a great fan of Nicolas Cage and his performance is really good considering with what he was given to work with. Other actors were not so impressive, Gary Sinise seemed really forced and uninterested in a role that needed to be handled with a degree of subtley and care.

Overall its a bogstandard action thriller that is fairly entertaining, but its not a film that will live long in the memory, a shame considering the vast amount of promise it showed at the start.