Review of Spartan (2004) by Shaleem H — 13 Mar 2004

I can't believe there's even mixed reviews about this movie! It was perfect, sincere and unpredictable. The acting and script were great. The thing about this movie is that there is no exposition, so the actors never spell out what is going on. You come in like an observer, where the action is just happening before your eyes- no explanation- but through your observations, you can figure it out. Most scenes start out with you predicting one thing, but then realizing another. It's got a memento feel about it because it gives you the fun task of figuring things out. - But everything is in chronological order. This movie definately highlights the movie making virtue of playing your audience to their highest intelligence- without using artificial plot devices.

Great acting, great characters, great writing, great look and feel. Riviting- suspenseful, and definately a movie that makes you care about the characters. At no time is it cheesy or hokey or artificial.

Finally a movie for intelligent people! So many suspense movies are so easy to figure out- they just play down to some average intelligence so that they can be profitable. Here's actually something to keep you going- like "The Game" but different, more realisitic.

I highly reccommend this movie to people who know movies, and to other people who don't have a hard time figuring out what's going on in complicated movies.

It's got Val Kilmer, Ed ONeill and William H. Macy if you like famous actors . . .