Equilibrium Review

Equilibrium Review

The irony about watching Equilibrium is, that while technically proficient and totally functional at its job, like its protagonists, it leaves you strangely unexcited even in its fight scenes, and not really feeling any emotions towards it, one way or another, once its anticlimactic ending is over. It’s one of those interesting concept B movies that Christian Bale made before his career exploded with Batman Begins, but you have the feeling that like Reign of Fire, this probably sounded better on paper than in execution.
One of the main problems is it constantly reminds you of better and more original stories and movies, like 1984, THX 1138, Fahrenheit 451, Brave New World, and a large dollop of The Matrix. Also, its very concept seems to work against it. As the film is about a Cleric, a security enforcer who stops taking his emotion suppressant drug and starts to question his life, a film full of people not experiencing, or pretending not to feel emotions, doesn’t leave a lot of room for expressive acting. Indeed, I felt watching it that Bale seemed curiously unmoved most of the time, while the villains of the piece seemed to be hamming it up, banging desks and sneering enough to set a bad example to the population they are trying to control, but then maybe the point was they are simply intent on crushing the common man’s spirit but have different or more lax rules for themselves.
Also, after a long build up the ending felt very rushed and pat with Bale only having to contend with killing thirty guards, and without breaking a sweat, and a frankly rubbish at fighting Taye Diggs, who for all his talk, is dispatched far too easily for audience satisfaction. A few shots of the underground overpowering the police while bombs go off in the distance, and your left wondering why they needed Bale at all, and why he didn’t act sooner and save the lives of several key characters.
On the plus side, it is fun to spot the recognizable actor in a very small role, and while non of them are huge stars it’s still odd seeing Emily Watson, Sean Bean, Sean Pertwee, David Hemmings, and weirdest of all for English viewers, commedian Brian( it’s only a puppet)Connelly being beaten up by Batman. Either the director called in some favours, or they all had a few days free, and were in the area. Also, a few scenes do work well, like Bale trying to hide his new found puppy from the authorities, or being grilled by his Nazi youth like son, to increase the tension momentarily. Although they become quickly repetitious, on first appearance, the fight scenes- a mash-up of martial arts and Spaghetti Western gun battles is impressive, and an improvement on the Matrix. However, like my favourite moment, Bean’s line-reading of ‘it is,’ that changes from questioning to agreeing once he’s administered the drug/realized he’s become too obvious, your memory of the film after watching it, quickly changes from thinking it was pretty good, to whatever happens next in your life, which isn’t a good sign. 7/10