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Check out "The Book of Eli"

Frank Warren
The Commuter

Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Eli
Once again, Denzel Washington comes through the screen with a larger-than-life role in the new movie “The Book of Eli.” Full of great action-packed sequences and a plethora of surprises, this movie will be a treat to apocalyptic adventurers everywhere.

For 30 years, Eli (Denzel Washington) has been walking across America to the west, carrying a book that “God” has told him to take to a certain city by faith. After many mishaps, he finally comes across a functioning, populated town so that he can charge his iPod. During his time there, trouble breaks out and he finds himself before bad-guy Carnegie (Gary Oldman). They have a scuffle over the book, which Carnegie has been searching for all his life. Meanwhile, Eli meets Solara (Mila Kunis) who follows him when he leaves town. Right up until the end it’s a page-turner of a movie with a surprising ending that speaks a lot about the value of having a certain kind of faith.

Roger Ebert, in his blog for the Chicago Sun-Times, says: “The Book of Eli’ is very watchable. You won’t be sorry you went. It grips your attention, and then at the end throws in several “WTF!” moments…”

Michael O’Sullivan of the Washington Post said: “Most people have some good in them and some bad. This is one of the messages of ‘The Book of Eli,’ a hyper-violent, post-apocalyptic Western in the mold of ‘Mad Max’ that can’t make up its mind whether it wants to be corny or misanthropic.”

Though there are some Christian references in the movie, most viewers shouldn’t find things overwhelmingly spiritual. “The Book of Eli” is still an action movie, with lots of shotguns, ladies, killing, broken bones and gore.

Alex Remington of the Huffington Post sums it up best when he wrote this concerning the movie: “As movie premises go, it’s hard to top a post-apocalyptic action movie. Every scene and setpiece is a perfect empty canvas for a lunatic art department to create a frightening, barely recognizable vision of our world to tell a story with burnt-out rubble of how humanity destroyed itself, as we all know will happen some day.”

There are many great movies coming out with special effects; this movie is in my top-ten of 2009-10 because it has a good plot, awesome special effects, and it has a great cast to go with it. Gary Oldman plays an awesome super-villian and Denzel Washington is a truly heroic figure in the quest for good. If you liked “Mad Max,” you’ll love this movie. This movie gets four out of five stars.

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