Review of S.W.A.T. (2003) by Acehall — 29 Dec 2013

Odd that people would critique this movie with complaints about no character development, no effective storyline, etc. Whenever you have a dynamic ensemble cast, you must balance the story between character development and the story arc--I.

E., action. It's easy to criticize from an armchair, but trust me, actually doing it is difficult and nerve wracking...not to mention, budget eating and time snarfing. And when you have a movie such as S.

W.A.T., on top of it all, people pay for the action. I am sure that miles of film are littering the editing room floor that would have fluffed up each character into a movie of their own. However, the sacrifices to the God of action at the expense of the God of brevity weren't without their necessity.

I like action. Were there parts that were slow and maybe unnecessary? Of course. But every storyteller, in every medium, wants the target audience to know SOMETHING about the main characters, even if some of the chosen scenes seemed poorly thought out, or in some cases, pure filling.

..without the satisfying fullness that comes with a good story 'meal.' The action, while a bit murky in a few places, was mostly satisfying. The story, while a bit weak, followed the narrative arc that I would expect, fairly straightforwardly from beginning to end, with only a couple of false steps when it came to individual character story lines.

And, of course, as in most good cop, bad cop movies, the filmmaker tried to blur the line between good and evil, with 'good guys' doing the 'wrong' thing, and at least one of the bad guys trying to do the 'right' thing.

Ah, Hollywood. One day they may get it right. But for now, real life has more twists and turns than even S.W.A.T. could ever have seen coming, even with their high-powered sniper scopes at the ready.