Survivor Movie Review – Smartly Stupid
“It was an accident. He tried…” Hello, world wide web. I’m Decker Shado, the internet personality with the best hair. And welcome to week seven of THE SUMMER OF MILLA JOVOVICH! Which brings us to Well, the first one I’ve done in a while that isn’t based on a video game. Survivor. Well at least it’s not Resident Evil: Survivor. Released in 2015, Survivor isn’t even the genre of film I usually tackle. This here’s an action thriller with big actors giving serious performances and talking very matter of fact about matters of national security. and the reason I generally
don’t review that is I usually don’t even watch it. It’s a whole bunch of people talking to each other, trying to act smarter than they actually are, trying to have the writers sound smarter than they actually were and trying to get me to feel at all invested in the fate of the daughter of the second cousin of the archduke of Burger King. But what do we get with Survivor? Well, we get Milla Jovovich, who plays a background checking master who is the best at what she does. However, bad guys are going to do bad things
and before you know it, bam, she is on the run, desperate to stop the evil plot while her own people ignore the clear and present danger to instead try to bring her
they head back to restock, the men will die before they return. So they fly forward bravely into battle. Low on ammo, full on ammo doesn’t make a lick of difference once you’ve caught the business end of an RPG. As such, they are captured and their dog tags removed. This is because this is 21st century warfare and the baddies got to google who these motherfuckers are so they know what to do with them. All right. One of them piques their interest. Nevertheless, it’s time to douse them in gasoline. I’m guessing that the title is not in
reference to Ray. after this, we suddenly jump over to London at the US Embassy. Got to introduce some new characters such as Alvin Murdock, played by Sean Teale, Robert Purvell played by Regé-Jean Page, Joyce Su played by Jing Lusi, Naomi Rosenbaum, played by Antonia Thomas and of course Kate Abbott, played by none other than Milla Jovovich. This is the visa crew and Sam Parker, played by Dylan McDermott, calls a meeting Bringing Along Sally, played by Frances de la Tour. those dastardly terrorists are at it again and since they recently improved documents security, their old forgeries
aren’t doing the trick anymore. “Now our enemies know they can’t forge Visas. That means they’ll be looking for ways to get real ones. The kind you hand out every day.” Gotta love it when a movie pulls everyone to the side like hey, you know that job you’re already doing? And is very important? Well, it is especially important right now. So you make sure you do your job. It’s going to be very important because we literally made a scene about it “We’re not saying that you have to give everyone the 3rd degree.” She gives him a
look like, But I want to. Bill, played by Robert Forster, explains that most of their applicants are just nice people. But Sam points out that some might be terrorists, which is why they brought along. Milla Jovovich Kate is the best bitch in the business and if any applicant seems off, send it to her, don’t have to wait long as the very next scene introduces us to Emil Balan, played by Roger Rees. being a Romanian expert in chemicals is suspicious, But the real red flag is that Roger played the Sheriff of Rottingham in Robin Hood: Men
in Tights. Thus they sick the Jovovich on him. “You have listed a medical conference as the reason for visiting the United States.” “Yes.” “This conference is for pediatricians. You’re a general practitioner.” “Many of my patients are children.” Resulting in a back and forth about as exciting as a courtroom cross-examination. Like. Like in a real courtroom. Not in not in movieland. I was hoping for something more along the lines of like, a Yu-gi-oh battle. However, Bill pulls Kate aside and chastises her for doing her job. Sure, he’s got red flags all over the place, but they’ve
got a line around the block and don’t need anything slowing things down. He already passed a background check. What are the chances he could possibly be a terrorist? “We have a problem. A new security expert, from Washington.” I mean, other than the fact that we clearly see him colluding with terrorists in the next scene other than the terrorism, he’s not really a terrorist. This would be Pavlou, played by Benno Fürmann. hearing that Kate is trouble, he moves to fix that with a visit to The Watchmaker played by Pierce Brosnan. He says he’ll get right on
that murder thing on the morrow. But before we do, we have to quickly introduce Lisa, played by Genevieve O’Reilly. She’s an artist and a close friend of Kate, very close. “So all work and no play, huh?” “It’s complicated.” “Is everything a state secret with you?” You know, one of those special close friendships that we all know damn well what it is, But they never really commit to the bit because, well, you don’t want this movie banned in international markets now, do you? So they don’t spend the evening together. Kate has more digging to do using
Emil as a starting point to discover four other suspicious individuals who have already made it to the United States, calling Naomi about one of them at random in the middle of the night. She somehow remembers the event “I was checking him out, when Bill pulled the file.” “Why?” “He said I had too much on my plate, and he’d handle it.” and it was Bill who let him slip through the cracks or rather just kind of shoved him through. that sounds serious. So let’s move on to the whole murder plot by The Watchmaker, dabbing a random
glob of solder onto a generic SIM card he heads outside to nab a handy dandy brick from one of those piles that seem to pop up in the cities every now and again. But this brick has a secret inside C4, jamming it into a container with a handy dandy detonator. It’s ready to go. Later. First, Kate heads to Vicker’s pharmaceutical is to ask the head honcho if he can give her all the deets on Doctor Balan. However, Perry, played by Malcolm Sinclair, “You need to present a proper written authorization from the home office to even
inquire about security clearances.” pulls out the red tape to block this request. She doesn’t let that slow her down, though. Heading to their own classified data vault protected by Howie played by Alex Beckett. “There’s no authorization.” But she also doesn’t have the clearance to do but no bother. Kate tells him that Parker probably just forgot to mention that she has authorization and somehow that passes the sniff test and she gets a thumb drive of classified information. I have to hurry, though, because she’s being called to be chewed out by Inspector Paul Anderson, played by James
D’Arcy. Perry called him up about Kate’s penchant for asking questions without a permit and how insane it is that she is abusing her powers simply to make a poor man’s life miserable. Also, hey, here’s another boss of hers, Maureen Crane, played by Angela Bassett. “I didn’t know you were joining us.” “I didn’t either.” She’s a pretty important player in things moving forward. And we’re already 20 minutes into this movie. We’ve got to introduce her at some point. It’s not all bad. Sam does stand behind Kate’s judgment and says if she thinks the guy’s a risk,
then she should be allowed to dig deeper and make sure he’s clean before just handing off a visa. Perry thinks she should be more hands off with such a politically connected individual. And besides, “A few years ago, his wife applied for a visa for emergency medical treatment in the United States. She died because some bureaucrat kept asking for one more piece of paper.” God damn, the guy himself is a doctor and even he couldn’t do anything about the UK’s ridiculous wait times? “Congratulations. You’re already making enemies in high places.” At this point, I wouldn’t blame
her. She was like, Fine, fine. Fuck it, let him through. But don’t come crying to me. If next week a few thousand people just suddenly die somehow. It’s not all bad though. Look, everyone’s come together for Bill’s birthday, except for Bill, who slips away for a minute to log in as Kate and delete records of all the baddies he’s given passports to. This means he’s nowhere near the restaurant when a package arrives specifically for the pressed duck they will be having. But oh, darn it. Everyone got ready for this event so fast they forgot to
get Bill a present. Not to worry, Kate can go across the street to the incredibly convenient gift shop and pick something out. All the rest of them at the table Get a special delivery from The Watchmaker. For you see, The Watchmaker is an assassin, and his specialty is subtlety. Like… usually. This explosion kills everyone except for Kate. She’s just mildly scuffed. And no, she wasn’t far enough away to be safe. The shopkeeper died too. Kate is simply Milla Jovovich. And let’s face it, she could have been there at the table serving the dish as it
blew up, and she’d just be left there with soot covering her face. Looney Tunes style. As she shuffles around looking for help, though she encounters The Watchmaker who tries to shoot her. But a random explosion gives her the chance to escape, fleeing for her life. She escapes for long enough that everyone else shows up like, Hey! The fuck happened here? They can figure out the place blew up and everyone died except for Kate. But how? “So she knows the city and she’s good at her job. Tell me something I don’t know.” “Well she’s better than
good, London’s considered a senior posting. She speaks 4 languages…” Yes, she’s Milla Jovovich. You’d think Detective Anderson would have noticed at least that much as she has continued to run. Who would you have to find? But Bill telling him about the explosion and death, he’s like, Yeah, I know. Why couldn’t you just die as well? So they fight, and in the scuffle the gun goes off and Bill is killed. “It was an accident.” Cameras everywhere, not just in the phones, but like in the UK. And yet somehow the only thing they actually managed to catch
here is her standing there with the gun after the fact. Yeah I know movie plots like to bend reality sometimes, but geez. What the fuck was Bill carrying one in the chamber and literally nothing else? So she must run! Again! The Watchmaker nabs Bill’s ID and Kate shows she is still the good guy taking the gun to a rubbish bin to avoid littering charges. Detective Anderson is like, Well, that’s it, Sam. Your girl’s a loose cannon on the run and we’ve got the smoking gun. Use those GPS trackers you have in her ID to track
her for us. But wait. He realizes Bill’s ID is missing. Where is it now? With The Watchmaker and this guy. “Trevor. I work with Fred.” “I only work with Fred.” That’s too bad. Ain’t no Fred in this movie. So just take what you can get. So Trevor gets right to work. He’s going to reverse engineer the GPS tracking chip thing. Well, it’s good enough to give the watchmaker a way to track Kate while he works. He makes small talk, asking him if he liked the video yet maybe even subscribed if he hasn’t already, Or share
it with your You know what? You do you. Still on the run, Kate has a problem. Her face is all over the news and she’s got nothing but the shirt on her back. Therefore, she calls up Lisa like, Hey, how about you give me some of your clothes and money? Lots of it in a public place with lots of people. Lisa’s like, Sure, why not? What are best friends for? But while that’s being set up, we’ve got a hint what the baddies intend to do other than track down and kill Kate. A gas bomb. They
have a small test one here, but a bigger one in development for New York. “Made to the exact specifications necessary to trigger this device.” A 50 BMG, Full Metal Jacket? Not going wildly exotic, I see. That’s it? The one you said you got for New York is going to be four times bigger, which it still I mean it’s going to be a modest boom boom. Man, terrorists used to be impressive. On the topic of preparing to do very bad things, Maureen is on the warpath. Everyone dies except Kate. And then Bill is murdered. They have
Kate on video with a gun and. Oh, would you look at that? She nabbed that flash drive from Howie without authorization. Clearly, she just snapped and decided to murder everyone today, maybe erase those files that were shown to be done with her ID because she is working for the terrorists. Sam refuses to lose faith in her, though. “We don’t forget motivation and Kate’s is sterling. She lost some of her best friends on 9-11.” “Then why’s she still running?” Well, the two guys she ran up to for help today, both pulled a gun on her. And
you’re not exactly holding out an olive branch here. Sam isn’t the only one on Kate’s side, though. Sally hasn’t bought into the stories of the Mad Jovovich on the loose. She’s just trying to stick to facts. And the fact is that the bomb at the diner had traces of chromium. “The Watchmaker.” “Or whatever he calls himself these days.” He’s credited as Nash. But while The Watchmaker might not be the most badass moniker, it beats the hell out of Nash. “He’s had so much reconstructive surgery no one knows what the hell he looks like.” That’s a
funny way to put that in some scenes he has a mustache and glasses and in others he doesn’t. But what’s this? Kate’s locator has just popped up at the corner of Pancreas Road. So Sam needs to get there at once. That’s where Kate has decided to rendezvous with her BFF and also where the Watchmaker knows to look for Kate. Calling in a bomb scare, The Watchmaker gets the security teams on high alert, giving Kate little time to do much but tell Lisa thanks for the scratch. Now get out of my sight and run like hell.
But before the watchmaker can get to her, Sam shows up. But before Sam can get to her, Anderson shows up. So she flees into the underground to escape pursuit, slipping down darker and darker tunnels. She eventually loses the police, but she also lost track of someone else who slipped out of frame. “What?” Got to love how this movie is gritty and real and down to earth. But every now and again you get a sense of those Jovovich powers kicking in. Shaking off the flashbang to stab the watchmaker, Kate leaps up and continues to run like
hell. But she isn’t fleeing at random. No, she’s still Kate Abbott: passport background checker extraordinaire and intends to get to the bottom of this mystery. Heading to Bill’s old apartment and still immediately running into someone. Sam, fortunately the only one who thought to check this clearly related location just in case at just the right time. But he still has to tell her to take off that damn tracking device. “Give me your ID. We don’t need anyone else tracking you.” “Do you think he’s tracked me all this time?” That’s right. A big damn explosion will mildly
put it on the fritz, but a little heel stomp’ll finish it right quick. Anyway, Bill was the guy in the background behind all the terrorists visas. But why? Well, perhaps this padlocked door holds the answer. It’s the door to Johnny’s room. Bill’s son, who was captured in the opening, digging around, they discovered DVD-R discs where the captured Johnny sent video messages to his father, imploring him to do whatever it is that terrorists want. “Do you think there’s a chance…” “I doubt it, look at his eyes. He’s swimming in dope. Someone kept him alive for as
long as possible to get this footage.” Sorry, but the algorithm demands content. These shocking revelations prove that Kate is innocent, and Bill was being manipulated by the same dastardly forces that must have hired The Watchmaker to kill Kate as well. So calling up his backup, Sam finds out, Hey, they’re fucking dead. “Let’s get the hell out of here.” Jesus Christ, doesn’t anybody knock anymore? No surprise. It’s The Watchmaker. So she runs and a chase ensues. Short but awesome as right after the stairwell, Kate gives them the slip and calls up Sally, conveniently enough, just in
time to eavesdrop on Anderson and Maureen discussing their Kate problem. “If you get her in your sights, do not hesitate. Do you understand?” “Yes I do.” “The longer she lives, the more people die.” But oh darn it, Sam got knocked the fuck out in that blast and can’t explain that Kate is actually innocent. And Maureen, her boss, is trying to kill her. You know, business as usual. But Sally is still secretly on Kate’s side. And Kate knows what she has to do. She must reach the vault in the embassy. It’s going to be tough. Lockdown,
soldiers everywhere. But Sally can pull an Epstein, conveniently causing the cameras to malfunction. Right when Kate breaks in, whip up her own fake I.D. and break open the computer. Swiping a hard drive. She lets Sally know that the terrorist she tried to stop is heading to New York right now. So while she escapes, Sally tells Maureen about the evil Emil and his intentions to do terrorism, “If you act now-” “No! Don’t you see what Abbot’s doing? She’s trying to get us to chase a shadow instead of her!” just to quickly establish that, no, nobody is
going to do anything about the actual bad guy and it is going to come down to Milla Jovovich to save the day. So forget about the actual murderer about to murder a bunch of people. Milla Jovovich is our top priority. Sally tries to fart around with tracking her as much as possible, but her passport has cracked and itinerary traced. Very fortunately just after she finished arriving at JFK. So they don’t catch her even more convenient. The first taxi driver she runs into just so happens to be unlicensed and just so happens to be perfectly fine
keeping hush hush about her illegal ass. But New York is a pretty big place and they don’t even know what a terrorist who specializes in explosive gases would use to kill as many people as possible on New Year’s Eve. “To prevent the ball from overheating, a coolant gas is piped into the ball just before it is attatched to the pole.” How convenient and completely ridiculous that things lit by LEDs that uses about ten toasters worth of electricity in order to power it. It does not need coolant, but that wouldn’t make for an epic final confrontation
now, would it? So she tells her driver to take her to Times Square on New Year’s Eve with less than 20 minutes until the ball drops. Unsurprisingly, they only get so far and she has to walk the rest of the way. But after she spots Emil and moves to follow him, a random goon attacks. So she beats the crap out of him and takes his gun. Returning to the chase, she loses her target. Or does she? Her Jovovich senses are tingling and she knows where they went. “Can I help you, ma’am?” “The guys that just
came in, where’d they go?” “1501.” But you could have tried just asking first. Just saying. The Watchmaker is up there with him pulling his gun out of a grandfather clock. Oh, okay. Okay. It’s it’s pretty on brand, but you do realize that you just smuggled a gun from the UK to America. You smuggled a gun from the UK to America. Shit does not have to be this complicated. By the time Kate gets up there, they’re gone to the rooftop. The watchmaker is prepping the rifle to blow up times Square. While Dr. Balan stands by to
witness vengeance for his wife. “How far will the explosion travel?” “Not this far.” “Good.” and the watchmaker just kills them. I guess he’s doing a dark side play through If there is any opportunity to do evil, he has to take it. Oh, so those are… Those are actually Raufoss rounds. Well, why don’t they have the green and white tip? Also, as their fight continues, it seems that nobody even noticed the gunshot or explosion. Just another day in New York, I guess, as Milla Jovovich beats the crap out of The Watchmaker, eventually tossing his ass over
the edge of the building. “3! 2! 1!” “Time’s up.” “Happy new year!” Aww man, if you’re going to turn him into a CGI ragdoll, at least let him bounce around like a dead guy in Fallout 4. Therefore, Happy New Year. The Watchmaker is dead, and most of the people in Times Square that night are still alive, much like Sam, who calls up Kate to congratulate her. If not for her heroic deeds, over a million people would have surely lost their lives. She made a difference. And if this movie is any indication, that’s in spite of
their incompetence. Nonetheless, that was Survivor, and heck, I had a good time with it. That surprises me honestly, as usually, I don’t care for thrillers, especially those that cover the actions of government agencies. More often than not, I see characters very quickly and dryly spouting jargon at each other, desperately trying to set up as complicated a plot as possible within the 90 minutes alloted for a feature film. Survivor, it’s far too stupid for that to be a problem. The sinister plot that slowly unravels is very simple. The guy knows gas. They make gas to make
things go boom. Stop the gas from going boom. Kate’s situation is similarly simple. She’s awesome at her job, but her superiors are either traitors or incompetent and at times it can be difficult to determine. But either way, she can only rely on herself and an incredibly small group of confidants. So with simple plans and simple motivations, that means the movie can just have fun with spectacle here and there. And I had a good time watching it. And the lack of complexity doesn’t mean that the movie wasn’t put together with care or talent. The acting on
display is serious, and that helps the thriller aspect of actually feeling like despite all evidence to the contrary, Milla Jovovich might not make it. At the end of the day, Survivor is a pretty decent flick for folks like me who aren’t fans of this genre. If you do like your thrillers to put the New York Times crossword to shame in both its depth and interwoven nature, this is a kiddy pool, but as a dumb action flick that isn’t dumb, despite how dumb it really is, it’s got some polish to it coming in at four disguise
glasses out of five, which based on the very low numbers on IMDB, I won’t be surprised if I get a lot of grief for. But hey, what can I say? I liked it. Oh of course I do watch and enjoy some legitimately terrible movies, but thank you all for watching. I have been Decker Shado and remember, they were just very, very good friends. “Fucking technology.” Thanks again for watching a like is appreciated or a subscription or sharing anything but the murder thing that that that would be the most appreciated part but what else have I
reviewed that’s kind of thriller got some mystery to it. Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker. You’re going to have to trust me on that one. Or there’s always the algorithmically selected recommended video because I need to complicate this somehow.
