Shaft (2000): Dir: John Singleton / Cast: Samuel L. Jackson, Christian Bale, Toni Collette, Vanessa Williams, Jeffrey Wright: Mindless exercise in retaliation and violence. It is a remake of previous material starring Samuel L. Jackson as John Shaft whose methods of problem solving evolves around punching people out. Christian Bale plays a racist who murders a black male. Due to an error in the system Bale is released. Shaft quits the police force and decides to bring Bale in his own way. Plot is constantly sidetracked by a gangster named Peoples and an ending handle to the lowest degree. Directed by John Singleton who is much too respected for material such as this but at any rate, in lesser hands it would be a far worse film. Jackson is an effective lead who desires justice to the point of quitting his job. His methods of obtaining justice draws to question. Bale steals his scenes as a criminal gone free but resurfaces only to be arrested by Shaft again. It is interesting how he receives his just deserts. Toni Collette gives a decent performance as a suspect whom Shaft searches for. Vanessa Williams becomes more or less a potential romantic prop for Shaft. Jeffrey Wright plays a drug lord but again, the role is standard issue rubbish. There isn't much in this film that hasn't been done before, therefore this film should be shafted down a toilet. Score: 4 ½ / 10

I am rating this film a 'T' for Twaddle! in fact change that to a 'UT' for Utter Twaddle! Angelina Jolie is poncing and pouting away utilising her usual class A acting skills and those are the believable scenes. The film is filled with excuse after excuse for over played action scenes and the story line jumps so much you don't know where you are or why half the time. Granted there are twists that you don't see coming but sadly you literally don't care due to there being little to no depth to any of the characters. Clearly this has cost a huge fortune to make and if you like action films that make no sense then this will be right up your alley. Be careful not to fall down a huge plot hole though as this is riddled with them. One of the most ridiculous moments was when Jolie grabs a Russian style fur hat as she runs past a hat stall in order to disguise herself and in the next shot she is on a ferry unexplainably wearing a perfect matching cloak - oh well at least she looked like Nikita from the 80's Elton John track! Although having out of sheer nosiness just watched the Nikita video on you tube noticed Nikita looks rather like Jennifer Lawrence but perhaps I am just talking twaddle!

The hardest part about being a black cop is not getting shot by white cops when you pull your gun.The honkies in this action movie, however, know better than to mess with Shaft.When rich white boy Wade Jr. (Christian Bale) is accused of killing a black man (Mekhi Phifer), no nonsense detective John Shaft is assigned to the racially charged case. But the accused is allowed to flee the country when the only witness (Toni Collette) goes missing.Unrelenting, Shaft spends the next two years searching for her.When he finds her, Wade Jr. serendipitously returns Stateside with a sadistic drug lord (Jeffrey Wright) on his payroll.John Singleton's much-maligned reboot of Shaft isn't as blasphemes as perceived, with Sam Jackson serving as a worthy successor to Richard Roundtree.Besides, young African Americans need to be exposed to influential Black icons before the CIA assassinates them all.Yellow Lightvidiotreviews.blogspot.ca

The story builds it's crime case well, keeping the mystery element existing while revealing new details and small surprises along the way. Yet it kind of throws back at how the focus character seems to be so resourceful and calm at what he's doing. I think the movie should have a more solid backgrounder on how he can do these things. The action side is not that good at all, having too much close up shots and cuts from shot to shot just don't seem to add to the suspense. The acting side also doesn't really offer something. Samuel L. Jackson's acting is surprisingly slightly a bit his own standard here, grinning too much at the wrong times. Christian Bale's upper lip definitely wrecks up his expressions all the entire time. Vanessa Williams can add a color to the story but that's just it.