Doom was definitely not the best of the video games turned movies I have ever seen . . .
. . . but it wasn't the worst either. That honorific title goes to
House of the Dead - a movie that stunk so bad I can still get a whiff of it every now and then. But I digress let's get focused back on Doom.
I have never played the game, but my husband and brother tell me that it is just a shoot em up kinda game where you collect little key passes to other levels and rooms and the like (don't quote me on this folks, I wasn't paying very much attention - when they get to talking about video games, sometimes I kinda zone out). In other words, there wasn't much plot. So knowing this I guess I shouldn't have been surprised that there wasn't much plot involved in this movie.
Well, I was surprised and disappointed and this was probably due to the fact that I am a huge The Rock fan. Not that he needs a whole heck of a lot of plot for me to enjoy him, but he does need some. And I found him to be either woefully over or under the top in his performance of the aforementioned lack of plot. Although I have to admit that in some of the beginning scenes I was tickled pink to see his bare wide shoulders with the Marines mantra tattooed across them. Hmmmm . . . sorry - I got lost there for a second!
So this team of Marines goes out to investigate and recover data from a mission gone wrong on some scientific base on Mars. The team is comprised of Sarge (The Rock), Goat (Ben Daniels), The Kid (Al Weaver), Yao Chin (Mac), Duke (Raz Adoti), Destroyer (DeObia Oparei), Portman (Richard Brake) and Grimm (Karl Urban). They are a tough bunch trained to kill and do only what the corps orders.
Problem is that this mission involves a return to the site of a childhood tragedy for Grimm and meeting back up with his sister, Samantha (Rosamund Pike) who just so happens to be a scientist at the scene of this level 5 quarantine. By the time the team learns what is really going on and tries to do the right thing, Sarge has taken the whole obeying the orders of the core thing to heart and wants to basically kill every living thing that may have come into contact with whatever has been killing the scientists on this mission. This leads to a knock down drag out fight between Sarge and Grimm as well as a stupid video game sequence that didn't need to be in the movie at all.
With so-so monsters who all looked basically the same to me (save one really cool one at the end there ), a non-existent plot and a whole heck of a lot of bad acting
Doom was just doomed from the beginning. And it didn't get any better toward the end either where they just had to leave it open for a sequel.
Doom Movie Cast and Credits
Directed by
Andrzej Bartkowiak
Writing credits
Dave Callaham (screenplay) (as David Callaham) and
Wesley Strick (screenplay)
Dave Callaham (story) (as David Callaham)
Cast (in credits order)
Karl Urban .... John Grimm
The Rock .... Sarge
Rosamund Pike .... Samantha Grimm
Dexter Fletcher .... Pinky
Ben Daniels .... Goat
Al Weaver .... The Kid
Richard Brake .... Corporal Dean Portman
Yao Chin .... Mac
Razaaq Adoti .... Duke (as Raz Adoti)
Deobia Oparei .... Destroyer (as DeObia Oparei)
Brian Steele .... Hell Knight/Curtis Stahl
Robert Russell .... Dr. Carmack
Daniel York .... Lt. Huengs
Ian Hughes .... Sandford Crosby
Sara Houghton .... Dr. Jenna Willits
Blanka Jarosova .... Dr. Hillary Tallman/Imp
Vladislav Dyntera .... Dr. Steve Willits
Petr Hnetkovsky .... Dr. Olsen
Jaroslav Psenicka .... Dr. Thurman
Marek Motlicek .... Dr. Clay
Doug Jones .... Dr. Carmack Imp/Sewer Imp/FPS Imp
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Barbara Nedeljakova .... Girl at bar (uncredited)
Robert Nelson .... Security Guard (uncredited)
More Movie Reviews of Doom
Movie Review of Doom from Ars TechnicaDoom Movie Review and Information Page at The Internet Movie Database
