Antitrust (UK)

7 / 10
4 votes cast
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Truth can be dangerous... trust can be deadly
Certificate: 15
Running Time: 104 mins
Retail Price: £17.99
Release Date:

Synopsis:
In a world where unseen enemies can watch your every move, who can you trust? Ryan Phillippe (Cruel Intentions), Rachael Leigh Cook (She`s All That), Claire Forlani (Meet Joe Black) and Oscar® nominee Tim Robbins star in this fast-paced, sizzling thriller that crackles with "genuine intrigue" (Entertainment Today), "considerable suspense" and an "ingenious, stunningly cinematic payoff" (Los Angeles Times) you have to see to believe!

Young, brilliant computer whiz Milo Hoffman (Phillipe) lands an exciting and lucrative job at the world`s largest computer company, N.U.R.V. Handpicked by powerful C.E.O. Gary Winston, to work on a project that will change the way the world communicates, Milo thinks he`s found his dream job. But when his best friend, Teddy, is brutally murdered and clues lead to N.U.R.V`s involvement, Milo becomes obsessed with uncovering the truth. With his cunning and beautiful girlfriend (Forlani) and a sexy programmer (Cook) to help him, Milo races to beat Teddy`s murderers at their own cyber game. But as they close in on him, he realizes he may be too late to learn the most important code of all: Keep your friends close. Keep your enemies closer. And know which are which before you are killed.

Special Features:
Interactive Menus
Scene Access
Director and Editor`s Audio Commentary
Making Of Documentary
Deleted Scenes (including one exclusive to the Region 2 disc)
Alternative Opening and Ending
Music Video
Original Theatrical Trailer

Video Tracks:
Widescreen Anamorphic 2.35:1

Audio Tracks:
Dolby Digital 5.1 English

Directed By:
Peter Howitt

Written By:

Starring:
Rachael Leigh Cook
Ryan Phillippe
Richard Roundtree
Douglas McFerran
Tim Robbins
Claire Forlani

Casting By:
Cathy Sandrich
Amanda Mackey Johnson
Sean Cossey

Soundtrack By:
Don Davis

Director of Photography:
Richard Walden
John Bailey

Editor:
Zach Staenberg

Costume Designer:
Maya Mani

Production Designer:
Catherine Hardwicke

Producer:
Nick Wechsler
David Nicksay
Keith Addis

Executive Producer:
David Hoberman
C.O. Erickson
Julia Chasman
Ashok Amritraj

Distributor:
Metro Goldwyn Mayer

Your Opinions and Comments

8 / 10
This is the kind of film that requires you to adopt a particularly forgiving attitude in order to derive any real enjoyment. In my case, It caught me on a good day and although it`s quite far-fetched (and arguably mis-cast), I did find it quite diverting.

That`s not to say that it`s a great film (passable is the best description), but it`s certainly an evenings-worth of entertainment however you splice it. I don`t really care for the "teen" performances and melodramatic overtones, but the story is certainly solid enough and Tim Robbins is highly effective in his role. The plot stretches plausibility to breaking point on several occasions, but it makes enough sense in the end for you to forgive most of the earlier lapses.

It`s not an excessively original idea though and I immediately noticed the startling resemblance it has to another recent film. If you`ve seen "The Skulls", but you haven`t watched this yet, you may aswell save yourself the bother!. Antitrust is almost exactly the same as that movie, except it features a multi-national corporation as the villain instead of a secret society. The themes, tone and story arc are incredibly similar throughout and anybody that didn`t like Skulls should avoid this like the plague (a big vice versa if you did though!).

The disc itself is MORE than adequate and it screams "value for money". Some would call that over-praise for what looks like a merely mediocre selection (on paper at least). Fact is though, the extras are all high-quality efforts and there aren`t any "fillers" or puff-promotional pieces. What you do get is deleted scenes (particularly interesting ones aswell) which were cut after screen-tests and not necessarily because they were poor (they`re uniformally good in actual fact). The accompanying commentary for these scenes and for
the main feature shed some real light on why they were excised (the director on these commentaries is Peter Howitt who played Joey in "Bread" no-less!).

There`s a good 23min feature and a music video too, so the emphasis is on worthwhile material and not pointless space-wasting stuff. Needless to say with such a new title, the A/V quality is more or less faultless.

Basically then, a competent movie that has decent additional content. Not everyone will be as lenient as I chose to be and the film is admittedly far from perfect. That doesn`t mean you won`t enjoy it while it`s playing though and if you can de-activate your overly cynical-eyes for a few hours, then Antitrust may well have something to offer.

BTW- I wanted to give this a 7.5 for content, but .5`s aren`t accepted. In the end I went for a 7 because an 8 would be a bit too complimentary (but 7.5 is my "proper" grade!).
posted by Tony Vado on 7/10/2001 03:01