Wander ends on an emotionally satisfying note, positing the triumph of truth & justice amid a conspiracy-laden world. Echelon Conspiracy has something to do with Maxs ensnarement in a scheme to make an unauthorized expansion of NSA surveillance capabilities, and something else to do with a super-duper NSA computer that may be acting as a rogue agent with a hidden agenda. Max Peterson is a globe-trotting techno-whiz who installs security systems on computers. But the context that spawns it upends assumptions I cant begin to describe lest they ruin the surprise. Find showtimes and theaters for 'Echelon Conspiracy', Report: Warrant Issued for Roggies Bar Owner, Boston Pops Concert Move Keeps the Beach Boys, Ditches Joey McIntyre, Lawmakers pass compounding pharmacy oversight bill, Follow this list on Twitter: @BostonPopular. They travel; they endure passport control; they check in to hotels. The text messages send Max to a casino in the Czech Republic and recommend slot machines and blackjack tables where winning is guaranteed. Mystery & thriller. You're almost there! The basic premise was interesting, and then this film bogged down in a pedestrian mire of contrived, trite, formulaic caricatures and cliches. We've seen movies about technology going awry before. An actress named Tamara Feldman is on hand to provide a little eye candy. All Rights Reserved. Unfortunately, Max's good luck draws the notice of the casino's security chief, John Reed (Edward Burns), as well as FBI agent Dave Grant (Ving Rhames). On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. The Circus: Inside the Greatest Political Show on Earth: Season 8, The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power: Season 1, Link to Marvel Movies Ranked Worst to Best by Tomatometer, Signed, Sealed, Delivered: From the Heart. Then the messages direct him to buy a certain stock, which he then learns increases by 313%. Echelon Conspiracy subtitles English. Next, he is directed to a hotel/casino in Prague to gamble. Variety and the Flying V logos are trademarks of Variety Media, LLC. ECHELON CONSPIRACY Directed by Greg Marcks, Written By: Michael Nitsberg and Kevin Elders, Starring: Shane West, Edward Burns, Ving Rhames, and Martin Sheen, Rated PG-13 (violence, language, and one mild sex scene). Just below that it reads "Ticket Confirmation#:" followed by a 10-digit number. FBI Agent Dave Grant (Ving Rhames) interrupts the chase and handcuffs Max to interrogate him about the phone. Grateful and greatly impressed, Max follows subsequent text-message tips: He flies to Prague, checks into another luxury hotel and wins big every time he gambles in the hotel casino. subdl is the fastest subtitle website in the world Echelon Conspiracy (2009) Mysterious cell phone messages promise a young American engineer untold wealth - then make him the target of a deadly international plot. . Helmer Greg Marcks does his level best to keep everything moving faster than the speed of thought, so auds will have little time or inclination to note gaping plot holes and inconsistencies of character. Echelon Conspiracy 26 Metascore 2009 1 hr 45 mins Suspense, Action & Adventure PG13 Watchlist An engineer becomes the target of a deadly international plot after receiving mysterious cell-phone. Name and both e-mail fields are required. A car chase through Moscow ensues. Marvel Movies Ranked Worst to Best by Tomatometer, Jurassic Park Movies Ranked By Tomatometer, The Mandalorian Season 3 First Reviews: Still the Best Star Wars TV Show, Critics Say. Aside from that it's a fun film to watch. [3] On Metacritic, it has a weighted average score of 26 out of 100, based on 5 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews". Regal This may be his way of overcompensating in a role thin enough to be entirely defined by the photo of George W. Bush hanging prominently in his office. Max asks the computer to search for threats to the US Constitution. The author represented . Soon, though, government agents pursue the young engineer receiving them around the world. . It stole plot points and design cues from movies as wide-ranging as 2001, Flight of the Navigator, and a grab bag of Hitchcocks finest. They banned political opposition. THIS STORY HAS BEEN FORMATTED FOR EASY PRINTING, (separate multiple addresses with commas). Max Peterson (Shane West) is a computer security expert whose services in creating password protection software are desired around the world. Bobby Tahouri composed the thunderous musical score, and it, too, is very loud. The film is a found-footage one, which means that the footage can be MANIPULATED, relating back to the main word of the title; CONSPIRACY. The Echelon Conspiracy could spin off a veritable global economy of work in the form of books, magazine articles, documentaries and parodies to investigate and explain the dissonance between the pictures pre-production pedigree and the post-production fiasco. Even more unfortunately, Max also attracts the attention of a hardboiled FBI agent (Ving Rhames) with ties to a hard-line National Security Administration chief (Martin Sheen). We want to hear what you have to say but need to verify your email. To make things worse, the soldier-spies in the final scene engage in a more-sorrow-than-in-anger dialogue for the camera in which they wonder if Americans will ever learn, and if the wise Russians will be able to save democracy again the next time the U.S. pulls something like this. Even the action is hackneyed and boring. Synopsis. Other tech values are slick. Privacy Policy A young American computer engineer (Shane West as Max Petersen) acquires a mobile phone that receives strange text messages. Bad things, mostly, and I giggled at them more than once. Next, the messages direct him to a hotel/casino in Prague to gamble. Echelon Conspiracy is a more evocative title than a movie this stupid deserves. plus a strong politically correct ending; 10 obscenities . During a lot of the action sequences, there's a lot of annoying jerky camera movements. ECHELON CONSPIRACY is a B-movie thriller about a National Security Administration computer gaining access to all computers and surveillance cameras in the world for malicious reasons. Although the lead role is played by the relatively anonymous Shane West, who at times seems to be channeling Neil Patrick Harris, nearly everyone else has some kind of resume. He first wins one-hundred thousand Euros on a slot machine and then bets the entire amount on a hand of blackjack, getting 21. Would of enjoyed this more if the lead role wasn't so miscast. How much do you have to hate humanity to make a picture like that? Token theatrical run wont generate much interest, but viewers might be pleasantly surprised when this globe-trotting techno-thriller reboots as homevid and cable fare. Ever since he was a kid, he heard his grandmother talk about his "Pop-Pop's" fiddle. He first wins one-hundred thousand euro on a slot machine and bets the entire amount on a hand of blackjack, which he wins. In a way I was impressed by Ed Burns' ability to keep a straight face considering some of the dialogue he was saddled with. The plot, in brief: The Bush Administration directs its Shadowy Intelligence Agency to override Congress and capture every bit of electronic data in the world, then to analyze it for potential terrorist threats. After Eagle Eye I felt a shrugging appreciation for its charismatic stars and the polish of its making, they numbed me to its idiocy but numbed also any chance of actually enjoying the ride. . An action packed thriller with an all star cast, Echelon Conspiracy will have you on the edge of your seats from start to finish. Eagle eye clone but this has some terrible plotting. Someone has commandeered the NSA's top-secret global surveillance system, Echelon, to track his movements, and they send instructions: Don't shut off the phone or we'll kill you. Please click the link below to receive your verification email. Hey, Echelon guys: Heres some history for you: Between 1917 and 1991, the leaders of the Soviet Union killed about 20 million people, give or take a mother or son here and there. It is part of him. The Plot. Strange and goofy things keep blurting out of this movie from its performances to its plotting; things you wouldnt see in the oh-so-competent Eagle Eye. Directors Greg Marcks Starring Shane West, Edward Burns, Ving Rhames Genres Suspense, Action Subtitles English [CC] Audio languages English Buy HD $22.99 2023 Variety Media, LLC. Distributor: After Dark Pictures Run Time: 1:45 U.S. Release Date: 2009-02-27 Read Next: Building Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves: How Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley Brought the Ultimate Nerd Property to Movie Theaters, Linoleum Review: The Final Twist Justifies Almost Everything That Distracts or Impedes This Hard-to-Describe Drama, Seriously Red Review: Krew Boylan Gives a Star-Making Turn as a Woman Who Finds Herself While Impersonating Dolly Parton, Maybe I Do Review: Diane Keaton, Richard Gere and Company Enliven an Uneven Romantic Comedy, Woody Harrelson Slams COVID Set Protocols as 'Nonsense,' Urges Hollywood to 'Stop' Forcing 'Vaccination': Thats 'Not a Free Country', Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania Writer Surprised by Terrible Reviews: I Was in a Low Spot and Really Sad About It, Jeremy Clarksons Who Wants to Be a Millionaire to End With Next Season, No Future Commitments for More Work, Says ITV, Pornhub Documentary Money Shot Chronicles ItsSex Trafficking and Censorship Scandals, Michael B. Jordan Meets Reporter at 'Creed III' Premiere Who 'Teased Him all the Time' in High School: 'I Was the Corny Kid, Right? Genre: Action, Mystery & thriller Original Language: English Director: Greg Marcks Producer: Alexander Leyviman, Steve Richards Writer: Kevin Alyn Elders, Michael Nitsberg Release Date (Theaters):. We want to hear what you have to say but need to verify your account. If Eagle Eye borrowed freely from 2001: A Space Odyssey and North by Northwest, Echelon Conspiracy ups the ante with additional pilfering from WarGames note the climactic scene in which Max delivers a civics lesson to the rogue super-computer and two or three Jerry Bruckheimer action-adventures. Perhaps the greatest conundrum left unanswered by this film is that if the government is populated by roster of nincompoops, how did the God Computer come into being in the first place? Coming Soon. Its position within the U.S. intelligence community was at . Little notice was taken until 1997 when an obscure book by Nicky Hager, Secret Power explained the role and function of ECHELON in more depth. The image is an example of a ticket confirmation email that AMC sent you when you purchased your ticket. The Echelon Conspiracy is an example of why that happens. The Echelon Conspiracy has less money, less creative talent, and less dazzling action than last year's thriller Eagle Eye. Questions like, why the cabbie (Sergey Gubanov) who meets him at the airport just happens to be a card-carrying expert at hacking the exact phone he has. They practice every day. Why is this happening to him, and who can he trust? Dangerous security operatives chase the engineer across the globe, while a powerful government official pursues a mysterious agenda that threatens the stability of the entire world. To his credit, Marcks stages a shootout inside a Prague apartment that crackles with Bourne-again excitement, and even manages to add some fresh zip to a conventional high-speed auto chase through Moscow. In The Echelon Conspiracy, America is engaged in careless, self-aggrandizing acts that could lead to war or the occasional violation of privacy. Maybe I am alone in finding it so thoroughly hilarious, but that might also be because I think this movie is destined to vanish before too many other people see it, and not because anyone is afraid of its message that omnipotent spy computers are bad.The Echelon Conspiracy shows that it has no idea how casino slot machines work, so Ill treat it to another gambling analogy poker pros are driven crazy by playing with amateurs, because amateurs are so unschooled in how one is supposed to play certain hands that their unpredictable bumbling can cock up a whole game and, ironically, sometimes leave them as big winners compared to the supposed experts. The sole exception, Martin Sheen, tries a little too hard to infuse the pulp with importance by shouting during key scenes. . The actors including Jonathan Pryce as a haughty zillionaire, Sergey Gubanov as a fortuitously tech-savvy cabbie and Tamara Feldman as the requisite beauty with ambiguous motives are, for the most part, thoroughgoing pros who wisely refrain from trying to transcend the pulpy material. I believe that after Aaron was murdered, the Tarsus Club threatened Jim into making the ending of the film the way it was, with the interviewees concocting lies on the camera to drive away conspiracy theorists. But, really, all the plots and counterplots exist solely to keep characters racing from one country to the next Russia, Bulgaria and the U.S. also are on the itinerary so they can shoot and be shot at, drive and/or crash cars at dizzying speeds and, periodically, cast anxious glances at computer screens while frantically clicking at keyboards. Unfortunately, his nonstop success arouses the suspicion of the casino security chief (Edward Burns, billed here as Ed Burns). Action 2009 1 hr 45 min 8% 12 Starring Shane West, Edward Burns, Ving Rhames Director Greg Marcks Trailers Echelon Conspiracy Cast & Crew Shane West Max Peterson Edward Burns John Reed Ving Rhames Agent Dave Grant [4], Joe Leydon of Variety wrote that the film "plays an awful lot like a direct-to-vid knockoff of last year's Eagle Eye" and "ups the ante with additional pilfering from WarGames".[5]. (In fact, it's the basis of Battlestar Galactica, arguably the best science fiction program currently on television.) Any similarities between the two pics may be purely coincidental, but Echelon Conspiracy plays an awful lot like a direct-to-vid knockoff of last years Eagle Eye. To be fair, Echelon actually was showcased (under the title The Gift) at the 2008 Cannes market long before Eagle Eye hit megaplexes. 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