Big Game (2015) (English & Finnish Language)

Review

90min

Genre:    Action, Adventure

Director: Jalmari Helander

Cast:      Samuel L. Jackson, Onni Tommila, Ray Stevenson…and more

Writers:  Jalmari Helander

The president of the United States of America is stranded in a remote Finnish forest after Air Force One is shot down by terrorists on the way to a G8 conference in Helsinki, after meeting a local boy on his pilgrimage to become a man and master-hunter, the unlikely pair must band together to avoid the psychotic killers on their trail.

Samuel L. Jackson stars as “President Moore” alongside young Finnish actor Onni Tommila as 13 year-old wannabe hunter “Oskari”, in what is essentially a Finnish rural coming-of-age story combined with an outrageous Hollywood-style action/adventure, but made by Europeans in a beautifully rugged Finnish landscape.

At first glance ‘Big Game’ might look like it’s cut from same cloth as ‘Snakes on a Plane’, ridiculous and fun, “Presidents on a Plane” if you will, but disappointingly this film is very much a children’s adventure with all that it entails.

Expect every genre cliché in the book, outrageous action set-pieces, gratuitous explosions, endless slow-motion sequences, epic musical score, predictable plot and unoriginal dialogue, but this is not a parody and because it’s a kid’s film is never outrageous enough to entertain anyone over 15 and offers nothing new to the genre, nothing to make it a “slow-burn” classic or future cult hit.

The Bottom Line…

If you’re under 14 or have young teenage kids then ‘Big Game’ might be a worthwhile way to burn an hour and a half and prepare them for genre-defining classics when they’re older, otherwise there’s nothing for you here, nothing at all.

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Similar films you may like (Home Video)

Alex Rider: Operation Stormbreaker  (2006)

A talented teenage boy is recruited by a special division of British intelligence on a mission to save the world and avenge the death of his beloved uncle in this family Spy action/adventure adapted from a bestselling children’s novel.

Directed by Geoffrey Sax and starring Alex Pettyfer, Mickey Rourke and Ewan McGregor among others.

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