So, having read decent things about it, I rented Equilibrium from NetFlix. It tells the story of a future society where emotions are dampened by a drug, no war or anger exists, and the Grammaton Clerics who deal with those who commit "sense crimes". In practice, its a cross between The Matrix and Farenheit 451.

Its got insane gun battles, in a style called "gunkata" (not to be confused with Gymkata where a bunch of guys in tights beat each other up to make themselves feel better for wearing tights, but I digress...), which has a Matrixesque feel, without the bullet time. It also doesn't have high school level philosophy masquerading as deep though, or Oracles who go all Socrates on you and can't give you straight answer if your life depended on it. Ask Neo. In Equilibrium you know who's good and who's bad. John Preston is a Cleric who ends up committing all sorts of sense crimes and decided to bring down the government keeping the people down. Much fighting ensues and much agonizing over what emotions mean to be human occurs. The 'twist' at the end wasn't that surprising, but, overall, its quite an enjoyable 100minutes. I'd normally give it 3.5 stars, but it gets an extra .5 because it actually answers what few questions it raises and doesn't leave you feeling cheated out of your money. Even if you did rent it.

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Posted by JP Frantz at Monday November 24, 2003 at 10:34 PM
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