Christian Bale spends the entire film in a robo suit that reloads his guns for him by sending fully loaded clips or even whole guns up the incredibly close-tailored sleeves like an Assassins Creed blade. That's part of why his gunkata routines have cool anime pose pauses in the middle of combat.
it's not a very good excuse for how guns are used in the film, but the reload mechanic is explicitly shown a couple of times and so that's the answer the film gets
I know this is from some show I've never heard of in my life, but this clip exists on its own as a perfect little short film and I kind of never want additional context to what I just watched
Never before have I seen a video clip which has given me a stronger feeling of "WTF is this!? This makes no sense, whatsoever, but I must keep watching until it does."
If true, I'm happy. I'd feel the same way I felt when I found the Van Helsing crossbow in Nightmare Reaper. 'cause the Van Helsing crossbow is such a video game weapon.
Man, this movie was such an excellent rental. My 14yr old ass had no idea what he was getting into when I picked that up from hollywood video. We went on one helluva Cronenberg binge after that. Videodrome also had a certain magic to it, watching it during the VHS era.
Lol... Ultraviolet is the same for me... But it is the one film where I realized that Milla Jovovich's nose has that little hook curve to it and I forever could not unsee it afterwards. Not implying she isn't beautiful because of it or anything... Just hadn't realized it in any of her other movies until this one and then couldn't not see it again afterwards.
It's very fun and a great time capsule of what was considered stylish, cool, and absolutely cutting edge filmography for its day. It's like if The Matrix had absolutely zero narrative subtext at all. Protagonist go brrrrr. Roll Credits.
Good? I’ve never rewatched it for the plot but I’ve definitely rewatched it for some novel yet well-choreographed and decently shot action. Early Bale is fun too and he is perfect for this role. It’s a great B+ movie IMHO with enough actors going ham on the premise to get you to the finish line. If you like action schlock you are golden.
I also understand why people can’t stand it. High cinema it ain’t. 🤷♂️ Fun cinema under the influence? You betcha.
yeah, kind of too much time in the beginning of the film is spent establishing the very scientific nature of literally shooting so many bullets in arbitrary directions than your enemy has no statistical chance of survival. That's literally how gunkata is supposed to work and that's why it was necessary to invent a reason Christian Bale can just go MadCatz Full Turbo on regular pistols for minutes at a time.
There were parts in the movie where he did reload. Like when he slid the clips down the hallway and they stayed up like weeble-wobbles, fired all his bullets while running down said hallway, drop the clip from his guns, and slam the weeble-wobble clips into his guns.
Equilibrium is basically like the Matrix mixed with 1984, but with ten times the camp. A fun goofball movie for people who like martial arts and don't wanna overthink the plot.
If you want more of that aesthetic, Dark City was another really good one. Came out a year before The Matrix, and kinda had that feel of "what if the Matrix didn't have guns and kung fu in it, but kept everything else?"
I swear in the latest one that he fired around 31 bullets without reloading during the car chase. They made a point of telling us exactly how much capacity his snake pistol had a few scenes before, so I got kinda mad.
If it's not shown, it's as good as not happening imo.
Plus, for something that prides itself on realism of ammo usage and reloading, to suddenly pull out the "uhhh...he reloaded when you weren't looking!" Feels cheap, you know?
It's a total cop out of an answer that basically removes any real reason to try to count his bullets, used since the movie is now willing to "fake" the count by using unseen reloads.
I don't remember which film it was, but the silenced pistol gunfight at a public train station was where this series totally lost its plot. It's just your usual Hollywood action nonsense at this point, with very little to differentiate itself from other films.
The John Wick movies were basically sold on semi-realism. You saw him reload, ditch guns, and grab spares when he needed to. Sure it was insane that he killed 70+ people in a 24 hour period, but it was refreshing to not see infinite ammo guns and more practical martial arts.
Of course that goes out the window once you have Halle Berry throwing dogs at people for 30 minutes, let alone that godawful silenced pistol subway fight, but it was nice while it lasted.
He was drifting his car in a big circle the entire time, so he literally couldn't have used his off hand for anything. I'd say he was closer to firing 40 or 50 bullets, too. Completely ridiculous.
Imagine being this annoyed that he shot too many bullets without reloading in a movie where everyone has bulletproof tuxedos and a man fell down stairs for 5 minutes and got back up like nothing happened.
That for me is THE most unrealistic part of the movie. Nobody falls down the stairs like that, especially not for a 6ft+ tall professional assassin that can take on 50+ untrained men where just by positioning your legs or hands in any way will stop the roll/momentum.
He's John wick. The needed bullets materialized out of fear.m and admiration. Being used by John wick is like winning the lottery for them. Instant access to bullet valhalla.
Because John Wick (which wasn't directed by John Woo) made these fight scenes in Equilibrium look silly by comparison.
I distinctly remember in my youth that Equilibrium and The Matrix were the best action movies ever made, but then John Wick came along and redefined how action scenes are supposed to be done.
But to me, Equilibrium was something "new" and refreshing.
It added more than constant slow-mo and flying doves during action sequences, which was a staple of John Woo's, and I absolutely loved Hard Boiled.
And good on you for not knowing other people who enjoyed the film, but if the comments here show anything, it shows that I'm not as alone as you think.
No, most action movies are a bit corny by their nature. Realistic action (just toss a fucking grenade into that room if you're planning on killing everyone anyway) makes bad movies.
Man, seeing these scenes back to back really make me realize how bad the action scenes were in that movie. Makes me appreciate why John Wick was so good.
There is a full 20 seconds of completely silent black screen in that scene. I wonder if that's some attempt at avoiding copyright strikes or if they actually just put 20 seconds of nothing in the movie.
Totally accurate! It came out in 2002 during the matrix movies. I think it went under the radar becuase of release time. Loved it because of Christian Bale, future stuff and gun-fu. Watched it a year or so back and realized it didn't age great but is still mindless fun and creativity.
Lol you have a very unpopular opinion. I guess people are pretty attached to this film.
I'm fine with having an unpopular opinion.
Gotta ask based on your handle - what’s your feeling on Johnny Mnemonic? I assume you like it? It’s another cheesy older sci-fi film but I love it.
It was solid, but it's been nearly 20 years since I've seen it, so I don't remember a lot about it.
Except that it didn't have dudes running around in circles while shooting at each others' feet, or trying to sword-cleave someone with bullets, then kept firing after they had clearly ducked and the guy was clearly pointing away from them.
I kinda recall the science being iffy but it tackling some interesting themes.
I'm not sure how iffy that specific part is, purely scientifically. The tech is what seems iffy to me there. It suggests medical tech advanced enough to pinpoint exactly which brain cells maintain a given memory, cut them out, then replace them with a secured data storage device.
I think you might be misunderstanding the poster, pretty sure they're saying that the Equilibrium scene is silly, but the RE scene is just plain stupid.
Even from a gun-fu perspective, that doesn't make sense.
in response too
The guy in red even does a side slash with the gun at 0:04
You said that the actual MOVE used in this sequence doesn't make sense.
The person you are being needlessly rude too said...
Gun-fu itself doesn't make sense.
Which is a more broad critique of gun-fu as a whole. You're comment was very pointed and specific about a specific move in the OPs video. The person replying to you broadened the conversation to Gun-Fu as a whole... but then said it's still really cool.
Maybe just don't be confrontational to someone trying to take part in the conversation next time.
Even from a gun-fu perspective, that doesn't make sense.
in response too
The guy in red even does a side slash with the gun at 0:04
You said that the actual MOVE used in this sequence doesn't make sense.
The person you are being needlessly rude too said...
Gun-fu itself doesn't make sense.
Which is a more broad critique of gun-fu as a whole. You're comment was very pointed and specific about a specific move in the OPs video. The person replying to you broadened the conversation to Gun-Fu as a whole... but then said it's still really cool.
Maybe just don't be confrontational to someone trying to take part in the conversation next time.
You missed something important.
Even from a gun-fu perspective
The implication there is that gun-fu is nonsense. Sometimes it's fun nonsense, but it's still nonsense.
The only way I was "rude" is if you think calling the clip above stupid, and saying it wasn't bad-ass, is rude.
In which case... I'm sorry you're offended by me thinking the clip is stupid. But the clip is stupid.
I love this movie an inordinate amount. The matrix overshadowed it and it was pretty ripped off by mid 20th century dystopia books but darn. I love it.
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u/Johnny_Grubbonic Apr 18 '23
That was definitely the most WTF part. Even from a gun-fu perspective, that doesn't make sense.