Doom - Ray's Review

Doom (2005)
100 min

Directed by Andrzej Bartkowiak (Exit Wounds, Romeo Must Die)

Written by Dave Callaham and Wesley Strick (The Saint, Wolf)

Starring:

Karl Urban - John Grimm
Rosamund Pike - Samantha Grimm
The Rock - Sarge

Official Plot Synopsis:

"...The action takes place at Olduvai Research Station, a remote scientific facility on Mars, where something has gone terribly wrong. All experiments have ceased, and communication has failed. The few messages that do get through are less than comforting. It's Level 5 Quarantine, and the only souls allowed in or out are the Rapid Response Tactical Squad (RRTS) - hardened Marines armed to the teeth with enough firepower to neutralize any enemy...or so they think.

The researchers at this Red Planet station have unwittingly opened a door, and all hell has broken loose. A legion of nightmarish creatures of unknown origin lurks in every corner and stalks the countless rooms and tunnels of the facility, killing what few people remain. A hellish zoo of demons, Imps, Barons and Hell Knights has taken over Olduvai. And they're not giving it back without a fight.

Sealing off the portal to Earth, Sarge (THE ROCK), Reaper (The Lord of the Rings' KARL URBAN) and their mercenary team must use every weapon at their disposal - and some they find along the way - to carry out their orders: nothing gets out alive. Unfortunately, these things never go as planned."

Ray's Opinion:

Doom the film turned out exactly as I expected. Having read that it was to be directed by the mediocre action director who's-name-is-impossible-to-pronounce: Andrzej Bartkowiak, my hopes were fairly low (but I'll admit to being surprised by Bartkowiak's Segal film Exit Wounds managing to make the pudgy Segal seem vaguely cool again after so many STD - straight to DVD - disasters). I'd heard that ID Software were very reluctant to go ahead with a film unless all the stars aligned to make it as good as it could possibly be, so I thought maybe - regardless of the horrible MTV type director on board - they might surprise me with a good script. This is not the case. However, the plot is serviceable.

Here's how it works. Take a set of cliche soldiers with names like Sarge, Destroyer, Reaper and The Kid, give them all big guns and put them in a bunch of grimy corridors and get them to spout crappy dialogue that we've all heard before in better films and occasionally let them actually shoot something, which - until about halfway through - you only see in glimpses. Throw in a stupid sub-plot about the almost-main-character Reaper (Karl Urban) and his sister in the hope to add dimension to your characters... and fail. Get people to unnecessarily say "Fuck" so that you get an R rating and hope people will mistake constant crude language for genuine toughness. I guess I should be thankful that they didn't pussy out and make Doom PG-13; it's full of extreme violence and gore which at least entertains on a visceral level.

"Umm, what's the plot about again?"
I'm being harsh on Doom, but all the elements are so weak, the characters so cliche and the action so poorly executed that it just feels like one big missed opportunity. Though I have to hand it to them for the overall construction of the plot, it was pretty good given the material, which essentially boils down to walking down corridors and shooting stuff; but an O.K. plot poorly executed does not make a good film. I guess I'd hoped for a decent Aliens clone, but feared another useless game adaptation like Resident Evil. Doom is far better than the embarrassingly awful Resident Evil but it's miles from being Aliens' brother in law - it's more like Aliens' mutant twin who suffers from ADD and likes to bang its head repeatedly against brick walls.

Speaking of head banging that brings me to another aspect which is appalling: a horrible "heavy" metal soundtrack. It never complements the on-screen action and if anything detracts from the already weak atmosphere. Another negative aspect is the miscasting of The Rock. I love the guy and usually enjoy his charming performances, but here he is essentially playing a heartless marine and it just doesn't come naturally to him. Every time he said "fuck" (which is almost every line) I cringed, it just didn't sound right coming out of his mouth. He tried his best to look menacing, but I never bought it. The few parts where he lightned up were a welcome breath of fresh air, particularly when he gets his hands on the BFG.

"Big Fucking Gun." - One of the few laughs you'll get during Doom.

Having read this far you'll be thinking this is a film to skip, right? Wrong! All is redeemed in the awesome first-person-shooter scene where we see out of Reaper's eyes as he goes on a killing rampage. If only the rest of the film had been this much fun! It's a truly cool scene and totally captures the game in a way that no other game-to-film adaptation has ever managed. This alone made it all worth it for me, this and another scene about mid-way through where Destroyer (who must have the worst name out of the team) goes one-on-one with a huge mutant beast. It's an incredibly brutal fight and it makes the final climatic battle pale in comparison - which outlines Bartkowiak's lack of skill in making action films, one of the golden rules is to spread out your action scenes and always save the best for last, he may have saved the FPS scene till near the end, but he follows that up with a totally lame fist-fight... a big mistake that undermines the ending and leaves a bad taste in the mouth.

Overall - even with all these bad points - I still enjoyed Doom. It's loud, trashy, violent and dumb, but it knows it. If you set your brain on cruise control, you'll have a blast, however, engage your brain at any point and suffer the consequences! This is the kind of film that would probably be best after a beer... or ten.

6/10