On paper this possibly held a lot of promise . A high concept plot mixing action and adventure as a man on a mission leads a couple of damsels though badlands where other people are on a mission to kill them . The unfortunate thing is that when printed page is transmuted in to a film being broadcast on my television quite often it loses a certain everything . In effect what is supposedly a clever thriller ends up a noisy mess with lots of explosions and the only thing worth cheering for is the end credits Set in the near future tough mercenary Toorop accepts a job from a Russian gangster to transport a teenage girl Aurora and her guardian Rebeka to America . From the outset Aurora hides a secret . According to Rebeka Aurora is a child prodigy who is multi-lingual and has superhuman knowledge . There's nothing to indicate this is true and the film at this point is guilty of the screen writing rule of " show don't tell " but then Aurora drops a bombshell by revealing she is pregnant even though she's still a virginIt's at this point I had a flashback to one of the late Christopher Hitchen's monologues on the immaculate conception: " What one's more likely ? The whole natural order coming to a stop for a moment in time or some Jewish minx telling a lie ? " . Considering Aurora is quite happy to make a pass at Toorop I'm guessing she's as pure as grey slushy snow with yellow bits speckled amongst it . And there's not a lot of ambiguity involved , this indeed the second coming though if it'd be a miracle if the movie deserves a second viewing Don't be taken in by the relatively impressive cast because none of them make an impact . Vin Diesel is there to spout lines , kill people and remind everyone a gym is no substitute for an acting school . The rest of the cast that include Depardieu , Rampling and Strong are obviously just there for the pay cheque in a film that is more interested in explosions that only exist in empty hollow films like this . You know the type of explosions I'm talking about , those ones that see a rocket with a warhead weighing about two pounds and yet the explosive yield is obviously twenty pounds of semtex and ten gallons of napalm . BTW have I mentioned this disposable Hollywood rubbish is directed by the same bloke who gave us LA HAINE . How high the mighty fall

This movie is a very simple action movie, full of clichés popping out of the screen every minute or so. Even for the unambitious pretension of "action movie", it stills falls short of what you could expect to be a good one. Surely it has some qualities, but they are greatly overshadowed by the weak plot, directing, etc. If you are a fan of dystopian stories, you may enjoy watching it for its background story, but the main one is simply... bad. I, particularly, enjoyed the movie mainly because it's so bad I kept laughing at it. If you aren't so lighthearted, and doesn't have a particular taste for dystopia, you should steer clear of this movie.

In a near future, mercenary Toorop is hired to take a woman named Aurora from aConvent in to New York. In return, he will receive a large amount of money and a clear passport. Toorop joins Aurora and her guardian Sister Rebeka as they cross the dangerous Russian landscape chased by mercenaries that also want Aurora. On their journey, Toorop discovers that Aurora has special abilities and once in New York, Aurora discloses that she is a virgin and pregnant with twin., Toorop realise that there is something sinister behind his mission and that he and Sister Rebeka are not part of Gorsky's plans.Another huge failure from Diesel and Co, this was more of the studios fault rather than the star and director, and it's clear that this was chopped up to the point that it's almost difficult to comprehend what is going on other that we move from set piece to set piece with little happening I between.If you liked Diesel in A Man Apart and other below average offerings from him (more or less everything he's done post Pitch Black), you will discover that he plays the same character in every film, looking moody and fed up.Mark Strong and Cyrano De Bergerac show up for no good reason, and the whole thing finishes abruptly without much explanation of anything.It's Children of Men for people with a non-existent attention span, and while not as bad as it made out to be, it's pretty darn close.

Babylon A.D. is directed by Mathieu Kassovitz who also co-adapts to the screen with Éric Besnard & Joseph Simas from the Maurice G. Dantec novel, Babylon Babies. It stars Vin Diesel, Michelle Yeoh, Mélanie Thierry, Gérard Depardieu and Charlotte Rampling. Music is by Atli Örvarsson and photography by Thierry Arbogast.It's the future and mercenary Toorop (Diesel) agrees to do a high risk job of escorting an other worldly woman from Russia to America. Easier said than done since many others would like to obtain her as well.It's now on record as being a film that suffered many problems during production, be it the weather, studio interference (film has more producers than there were people in it!) or crumbling sets, it was a tough old shoot and director Kassovitz has disowned the film. Available now in a longer unrated/directors cut, the film is still a mess of a movie, which is a shame because the story is a hot one and the look and feel is suitably dystopian.On a basic level it achieves some expectations, Diesel is perfectly brooding and macho, we want him to punch, kick and shoot his way thru the movie, and he does. Yeoh, it would be a waste not to let her kick ass, and so she does, while a hankering for some futuristic gadgets and sci-fi babble (here in the guise of genetic manipulation) is well and truly catered for. But it's constructed badly as the film is choppy in pace and the scatter gun editing is simply awful. Quick fire camera work can work in action movies, but here it renders the action unwatchable, and is more likely to induce travel sickness than any sort of exhilaration. As for the dialogue, one is more likely to believe that it was written by a pre-teen than a full grown adult.Diesel's bruising efforts and the Cyberpunk design aside, it's a film that's hard to recommend with any sort of confidence. 4/10