Conspiracy (2008)

Wow! Such a good movie.

Am i the only one who thinks........Average?

A brilliant film that helped define a genre

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

"Conspiracy" has Val Kilmer playing an traumatized Marine who searches for his best friend, another Marine, who disappeared in a small town where no one seems to know about him and are not warm in terms of welcoming people who are not from there. The local residents of this city à-la Old West style built by a powerful businessman (Gary Cole) will do anything to bother Kilmer and his obstinate search.An more experienced viewer will have one title popping on his head while watching this: "Bad Day at Black Rock". Yes, "Conspiracy" amazingly resembles the 1955 film directed by John Sturges starring Spencer Tracy as the mysterious one armed man who defeats a whole town just to deliver an medal to an soldier friend of his. Both stories deal with small towners prejudices against foreigners; both stories have an main character who is handicapped in a way and somehow this isn't an adversity at all; and both plots take place in desert areas. What makes the older film better than the new one (this isn't a remake however) is the originality and the tension presented there, the mystery was more gripping. What is presented in this recent project is an action film with lots of shootings, bullets and knives flying, a simplistic story made to please an large audience who enjoys that kind of movie. Nonetheless, it's a decent and enjoyable action film, the required elements for this genre are all present here, Kilmer is quite good as the Marine who needs to put his demons behind him, after an traumatic event that he testified during the war in Iraq, rebuilding himself in order to find out what happened to his friend. Since most viewers really dislike old films, this is a nice substitute to Sturges film. But that one was an complete classic compared to this. 7/10

I am so glad that I rented Conspiracy before buying it!It was completely surprising to find out exactly how much Val Kilmer was emotionally invested in this movie! Judging by his bloated appearance and sleepwalking performance, I assumed he was only in it for the money and was bored or that he was deliberately trying to sabotage a film he felt was beneath him!In all four of the Val Kilmer movies I've seen lately (Conspiracy, Moscow Zero, Felon, and Dead Man's Bounty where he plays a corpse) he appears to be clinically depressed! I don't know what Val needs more, Weight Watchers or Lithium!Of the whole wooden cast only Gary Cole seems to be having any fun.Everything they say about the silly leftist slant of Conspiracy is true. I don't know any left-wingers that even watch any straight-to-video action movies. The only reason I can even conceive of this being made is as a Trojan Horse to get into living rooms and spit in the face of the people whom the filmmakers disagree.This is one big political screed that should be ignored as much as possible.

Extremely bad remake of "Bad Day at Black Rock" starring Spencer Tracey.If you liked this film I'd watch that. It's how a film like this can be done incredibly well.Kilmer does his best I guess, but a remake of a great film deserves a better kind of care from the producers.I don't know if this is part of the remake fad still going on or Val's slow return after the makeover but I don't rate this as even a blip on the film radar, I mean I like the idea but where was the tension, where was the intensity, everyone played a role and unfortunately that is all they did.

oh dear, it seems that quite a few gung ho Americans don't like films that point out the way big companies thrive on war and make lots of money out of it by supplying the goods to make war possible and then make even more money by rebuilding the mess they made.Don't let their innate bias put you off watching this film as it is a actually pretty good (apart from the ending 5 minutes which looked suspiciously like the studio waded in and made the director make a Segal / Van Damme type over the top conclusion). We actually rented the film because we thought it would be good stupid fun like a Segal film with lots of Saturday night 'whizzbangpoppery' but there is a lot more to it than that - I was starting to say that it reminded me a fair bit of a classic Clint Eastwood spaghetti Western when lo and behold! - turns out the name of the town is Lago - the same name as in High Plains Drifter!! Someone with enough intelligence and respect (writer or Director?) to sneakily name check a reference has got much more going on than the people who have dismissed the film cos they don't like the politics.So my advice is definitely worth renting - if you are a fan of thoughtful action films and like those classic Clint westerns cos this is a modern cousin of them. Enjoy