DOOM

[Andrew]

March is Martian Movie Madness Month at Badmovies.org.  To start it off, here is a review for "DOOM."  A movie based on the game is a fantastic chance to mix horror and action.  Unfortunately, having the Rock run around screaming a jumble of military jargon is not action, nor horror.  It's not even comedy, it's just infuriating.

Click here to go to the Review

[Psycho Circus]

Great review Andrew 

I totally agree on the point of making these flicks, an not sticking to any sort of blueprint laid down by the game?? They keep making films of videogames because they are popular and contain alot more original ideas than studios are pumping out. But once they have the rights, they chop and change so much and always bring on board people who can't act. These conversions are now cursed, before they even go into preproduction, as no-one wants on board. They now it's gonna suck and land straight-to-dvd in a hyper-second.

I love the DOOM games to death, but I hate this. It just reminded me of the Resident Evil films (also big let downs). I also find that what they set out to conceive seems far grander than what could have been done, by following the games. I mean they must have just sat there and gone: popular computer game + popular wrestler + CGI = $$$.

Just think if this had been made in the mid 90's, or if the DOOM games had been around in the 80's. This would have come across so much better, like Die Hard meets The Evil Dead, with Rob Bottin or Steve Johnson bringing to life the demons in all their gory, evil glory. I don't like it that it's a group of marines either. Just have the DOOM guy, (again, taking inspiration from Die Hard/Evil Dead) going into the labs on Mars, through the portals to Hell and getting his ass whooped by monster after monster, an surviving it all, with just a bloodied vest and some spare rounds of ammo to show for it. That's the movie I wanted....

[InformationGeek]

I've never played the game and since video game movies have such a bad history, there was no point of me caring to watch it when it came out in theaters and then out on video.  I still stand on my decision to avoid this movie and I am a better person for that!

Anyways, good review as usual and I notice at the beginning you had the movie had an unrated rating.  Strange, I believe the movie was rated R.  Was there an unrated edition of the film?

[Kester Pelagius]

I notice at the beginning you had the movie had an unrated rating.  Strange, I believe the movie was rated R.  Was there an unrated edition of the film?

Unrated DVD, yes.  If you go to my blog (http://cosmic-cinema.blogspot.com/) you'll see the splash screen in my review.  I think it's still on the front page, scroll down past the rants.  Never saw this one in the theater so I can't tell you what the differences are.  I do know that this one usually pops up in Walmarts bargain DVD section, in case you're looking for a cheap copy of it.

[Andrew]

Just think if this had been made in the mid 90's, or if the DOOM games had been around in the 80's. This would have come across so much better, like Die Hard meets The Evil Dead, with Rob Bottin or Steve Johnson bringing to life the demons in all their gory, evil glory. I don't like it that it's a group of marines either. Just have the DOOM guy, (again, taking inspiration from Die Hard/Evil Dead) going into the labs on Mars, through the portals to Hell and getting his ass whooped by monster after monster, an surviving it all, with just a bloodied vest and some spare rounds of ammo to show for it. That's the movie I wanted....

The sets are very good, and quite DOOM-ish.  I liked those.  The monsters, the real monsters, are great.  Didn't like the zombie-mutants very much though. 

Having a squad of Marines is OK with me, though picking up the story in the middle of the action could have been really wild.  Imagine if the beginning of the movie was John, wounded and bleeding, being helped into a room by Sam as gunfire and screams echoed through the passageways.  Cut to some of the other Marines as they meet their end in a nightmare of darkness that has grown claws and teeth.  Then cut to the unaffected part of the facility as the lights start to flicker and the reinforced door starts to shudder from impacts.  The UAC employees all panic, rents appear in the door...

This movie was a horrible missed opportunity.

[Mr. DS]

I received this film for non-reviewing puproses and ended up reviewing it after seeing how B-like it was.  Think Aliens minus a good pecentage of the coolness factor.  I think just about every stereotypical character in action films was in Sarge's group. 

The Rock's character is a bit of an idiot in this film.  Even though he was greasy, Portman had the right idea of calling in some backup.  Sarge kind of kept to the whole "we are the best around" attitude which annoyed me. 

Andrew, how did you feel about the the large painted on "Semper Fi" tattoo painted on the Rock's shoulders? 

[Ash]

Andrew, how did you feel about the the large painted on "Semper Fi" tattoo painted on the Rock's shoulders? 

I was wondering the same thing!   

[Jack]

I think I turned this movie off about two-thirds of the way through.  The actions of the characters were so blatantly nonsensical.  I can put my brain in standby mode, but when a movie requires me to turn it completely off, I usually just change the channel.

[ben2theedge]

It's about time this movie got a proper thrashing!
I never played the game, when I was a kid my mom deemed it too violent and forbade it, so I stuck with Commander Keen instead. I only saw the movie because it was on TV late at night, and I was at home doing what single guys do on Friday nights (absolutely nothing). I don't remember exactly but I believe there are about three monsters in this movie. Not three different *kinds*. Just three. I actually bothered to try to count them when I realized how insanely monster-less the film was. The filmmakers did a good job of inflicting a feeling of pain and misery though, which is appropriate for a film entitled "Doom". Few bad movies have actually managed to break my spirit and reduce me to sobbing in a fetal position, but this one makes that elite list.

[HarlotBug3]

Doom 3 is less fun to play than Doom 2, but a better movie to watch than Doom the movie.

Go figure.

The same irony can be found in a "The Rock" action figure.

[WingedSerpent]

The thing I find most interesting about this movie is how much the advertising featured The Rock-and he turns out to be the bad guy of the film. (Which was the only, interesting thing about the movie).

It would have been good to see some more of the monsters from the game.  Seeing the giant cyber-Demon would have bee awsome. 
A crazy The Rock getting so angry, he attacks the twenty ft tall beast with no weapons, just his bare hands.  Only to get cut in half.  Now that should have been how his character was killed off.

[Andrew]

Andrew, how did you feel about the the large painted on "Semper Fi" tattoo painted on the Rock's shoulders? 

I was wondering the same thing!   

I can deal with that.  Hollywood is forever putting weird tattoos on fake Marines.  Heck, real Marines are forever putting weird tattoos on their bodies.  In recent years there has been quite a bit of guidance put out about what is acceptable, and what is not (and where it can be tattooed).

[DoctorMcShocker]

Finally this piece of work gets a review. It feels so good to know that ohter people thought this movie was terrible. Anyone who played this game, I myself am an original DOOM and DOOM 3 fan (never really played the 2nd), will realize how they butchered the game. Honestly, where did this movie even come from? Did someone just scavenge through their old games and pick the one they used to play the most for a movie? Any way you look at it, it is a bad movie.

[Red Samurai Ninja]

I Player Doom on PC. I gotter my Doom DVD, and I've Watching This it So Awesome, he killer Aliens . 

[Kutter]

Because of this review, I just downloaded Doom via Xbox Live Arcade.

Now I shall re-immerse myself in one of the greatest games ever made, not The Rock involved.

Stupid movie.  Seriously, you have to be trying to miss the point of a game so much when trying to make a movie.  And considering there wasn't that much of a point to Doom to begin with, that is a special kind of denseness.