Review of Knight and Day

So,  this is my first review ever, and I want you to understand that I’m not saying whether you should see this movie or not… I’m just telling you how I personally felt about watching this movie. If your sensibilities are similar to mine, you may feel similarly, but that’s up to you… I’m not a critic!

So, I give this movie a thumbs up!

Obviously you can’t take this movie seriously, otherwise you won’t enjoy it as much… but the movie isn’t intended as a serious spy flick… it’s a romantic comedy set in the action world of espionage.

I had a big smile at the end, so that’s my first requirement met.

The gal and guy end up together, so  that’s number two met.

Bad guy gets his comeuppance, so that’s number three.

Quick synopsis from IMDB:

“June Havens finds her everyday life tangled with that of a secret agent who has realized he isn’t supposed to survive his latest mission. As their campaign to stay alive stretches across the globe, they soon learn that all they can count on is each other.”

Casting was good. Tom Cruise is always a favorite, and he has great chemistry with Cameron Diaz, who is always a pleasure to see on screen.

The story was entertaining, and I happily rooted for both the hero (Cameron Diaz) and the heroine (Tom Cruise) — for those not familiar with structure I’m sure that sounds funny, but in simple terms, this movie is about Cameron Diaz, and it’s Tom Cruise who helps her come to herself. Perhaps the story was not the complex twists and turns one expects from an espionage film, but this wasn’t an espionage film… it’s a love story.

Some may complain that Tom Cruise’s character was the superhero type, and had things too easy… but again, he wasn’t the protagonist, and although he accomplished his goal, it was Cameron Diaz’s character who saves him in the end, and in a romantic story  that’s the ticket… if it weren’t for her, he might have died, and they wouldn’t have ended up together. The ending, whereas it may not have been realistic, was funny and made me smile.

Can you tell that’s a big part of how I rate movies?… how I feel at the end is the key.

The editing was smooth and nothing jumped out. Music was good and appropriate for the scenes. I liked the color correction, with good skin tones — although I have to warn you, I like Michael Bay’s saturated look at lot more than I like the bleached bypass look of Terminator Salvation.

I also liked the directing, had a lot of good emotion, and I believed the characters. Good job James Mangold and Patrick O’Neil.

Director: James Mangold

Here are some stats from boxofficemojo.com on Knight and Day:

Distributor: Fox
Release Date: June 23, 2010
Genre: Comedy
Runtime: 2 hrs. 10 min.
MPAA Rating: PG-13
Production Budget: $117 million

Domestic:      $76,423,035        29.2%
+ Foreign:      $185,261,684        70.8%
= Worldwide:      $261,684,719

Not too shabby!

So, if you haven’t seen it, I recommend watching it, and I hope I didn’t give too much of the story away.

Val Gameiro

Filmmaker