Suddenly (2013)

People are voting emotionally.

Good movie but grossly overrated

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

I saw the original 1954 "Suddenly" movie several years ago, and I thought it was pretty good. This remake, however, just doesn't cut it. There are many reasons why it doesn't work, but I think the main reason is that its tone for the most part doesn't fit what should be a hard-edged thriller. The musical score is almost comic in tone at times, characters CONSTANTLY utter "clean" swears like "frigging" and"fudge" instead of real four-letter word swears (at least in the version I saw), and the bad guys seem too disorganized and soft instead of coming across as dangerous and intelligent killers. It seems that notorious director Uwe Boll's heart wasn't in this movie. Maybe it was because this project obviously didn't have a substantial budget compared to his other movies - it has that cheap and tacky look that plague so many other (bad) Canadian films. Boll's apparent lack of enthusiasm might also explain some real continuity flubs in the movie, like why it's snowing and snow- covered in some areas, though around the house where most of the movie takes place there's no sign of snow at all. It's all capped off with an ending that feels unfinished in a number of aspects. The end credits reveal that the creation of this movie was sponsored by a Canadian pay TV network, which are forced by a government-imposed quota system to sponsor a number of (almost always bad) Canadian movies every year. Based on this and the ton of other bad Canadian movies that have come from this quota for years, I'm really glad that Canada does not have a quota system for movie theaters!

I am not at all sure what the reason is for so many Canadian movie productions being of such poor quality. The fact is there is NO good reason for it. We have terrific writers, a wide variety of talented actors, and several great directors. A decent film doesn't start and end with any of that though. It starts and ends with solid producing, of which this production egregiously lacks.Suddenly simply falls flat from the get-go and never really takes off nor goes anywhere. For one thing a Presidential visit to a small town looks like a grand affair, but the portrayal of that in this film comes off as low budget and rinky-dink. The actual Secret Service would have been all over that town.Much of the dialogue is hollow, along with too much needless footage and shots, all serve to bring the watchability of it down further yet. Liotta's character had real promise but again, with not much in the way of meaty dialogue or depth of story even his is a somewhat tinny performance at best.Weak writing is usually the main cause for actors coming off as bad, while poor direction is to blame for actors over-acting. Weak writing however can at least to some degree be compensated for with solid directing, but sadly that's another thing this film is sorely lacking in. Thus the entire production comes off as thin and very low budget. Newsflash Canada: "Low budget" does not always have to look as such.Final thoughts --- This film does not do justice to the original with Frank Sinatra, not by half. The ending is somewhat inconclusive, and anyone who has developed any sort of connection with any of the principle characters is going to be disappointed at the lack of a decent story wrap-up. If you're bored and there's nothing much else on then go ahead and kill 90 minutes, but please don't blame me if you end up wanting your time back.2/10, and that's being generous here.

"Today is a glorious day. Today I get to kill the President." Barren (Purcell) has become disillusioned with the President and his policies. He devises a plan that will help deal with his problem. Him and his accomplices pose as secret service agents and take up a position in a family's house that has the perfect sniping position. When a local cop (Liotta) shows up Barren's perfect plan starts to unravel. Uwe Boll's trademark seems to be lame movies with poor acting but decent action. This one had both. The movie itself isn't really that terrible but it is also fairly generic and predictable. There have been many movies about trying to stop a presidential assassin and I usually like movies with that plot. I did like this one too but it's not one of the better ones and I don't think I would watch this again. I have not seen the original with Frank Sinatra but I would guess that one is better. I could be wrong though. Overall, nothing terrible but nothing amazing either. I give it a C+

I never saw Lewis Allen's "Suddenly" (1954), but I guess I just don't need, because I know a priori that it is an Oscar-winning film comparing to this atrocious remake made by an unskilled, dull and inept director that, besides being labeled as a movie-killer by making abominable, heretic and unintelligible movies, still get millions to produce plain pointless excrement.Nevertheless, I swallowed an aspirin and, maybe taken a bit away to the fact Boll's last movie drew some fair critics, I finally had the courage to assist a movie made by this European quarreling psyche. Unfortunately my expectations weren't wrong at all: It was like to have an urge to commit suicide or to mutilate myself for being an utterly idiot.Boll's cinematic masterpieces, according to him, 'Alone in the Dark', 'House of the Dead' and 'Far Cry' are all, cemented by virtually 90% of critics and spectators, a collection of rambling-disjointed narratives of absurdity, execrable directing, vile and poorly written scripts and an unbelievable populist egocentric paranoia product of a tormented mind.This movie, for which it was presented with established actors, fails miserably in achieving something other than a mind-blowing overly median hogwash.I really must go out and buy the original movie to make a sincere topic comparison and eventually assert righteously that Uwe Boll must pay in prison terms for brain damage to the public and serious technical incompetence. Even with Liotta and Purcell on the screen the movie drags on into a worn out monosyllabic clichéd and putrid dialog.The story of 3 assassins posing as secret agents who find an excellent sniper spot (a house) to murder the US president is tantalizing enough to draw a good script, but with Uwe Boll, that's not the case: For Boll it seems the only person to sense something about the fake agents is an alcoholic, self-neglecting and psychically affected and sacked ex-marine who can't cope with his friend death years and years ago. Brilliant!I really think there's not much more to say unless citing all the mumbo-jumbo and mediocrity that abounds in this Boll's vision of a film. Ultimately, dare me to advise you to spare your limited lifetime and patience and skip this for real - You won't regret, I CAN assure 100%.PS-> Another priceless story is how I ended up seeing this "piece of art". - But please don't ask me to, I cannot tell, Boll can lawfully sue me or else invite me for a matching box until K.O.