The Great Wall - Movie Review

Hey guys, welcome back to the channel, and today we will review The Wall, the movie. And guys, this, uh, movie review will be spoiler-filled, so if you haven't seen the movie yet, uh, I don't want to ruin the movie for you, so, uh, I'm going to give you a chance to exit the review Um, I like to try to go in depth a bit with my reviews, uh, so it's kind of hard to do a review without addressing some of the, uh, you know, main parts of the movie. So, uh, after you saw the movie, guys, come on back to the review and, um, you'll be good to go. So you should be gone by now, but anyway, guys, um The Great Wall is a movie starring Matt Damon, or Matt Damon, as said from the South Park characters. And I'm a big fan of Matt Damon, have been for many years. I pretty much have liked all the movies he's done. And, you know, even the complaint about the Adjustment Bureau movie, you know, even though, you know, that was probably one of his worst movies, The, uh, you know, even the, even the, uh, you know, what that movie was about, I found, you know, pretty interesting. I was able to get through it, but not one of his finest, uh, movies. But, uh, anyway, uh, you know, this movie, uh, you know, it talks about the, the Great Wall of China, and we find out that the, uh, Great Wall of China maybe wasn't built for some of the reasons history tells us it was built for, you know. And, uh, you know, so the critics have been slamming this movie quite, you know, pretty hard. It's, you know, it's, it's been, um, said to be another one of these white savior movies where you get this white guy going into another culture and he's, uh, you know, gonna show them, you know, you know, what they need to do. You know, like The Last Samurai with Tom Cruise and, you know, many other movies that have, uh, people feel have been whitewashed by Hollywood. And, uh, you know, with this movie, I only want to say that, you know, if that was the case in this movie, you know, this was probably, uh, he— I would say Matt Damon probably did that the less, you know, of, of all the whitewashed Hollywood movies. And the reason I say that is because, um, you know, when, when Matt Damon arrives on the scene, the Chinese pretty much, you know, not only know everything that's going on. They know more than Matt Damon. They're prepared to fight the, um, the threat, you know, more so than Matt Damon. And Matt Damon, you know, he's basically, you know, able to defeat one of the monsters by accident, you know, and he doesn't even really know how he did it. So, you know, the Chinese are, you know, you know, they pretty much are handling, you know, the threat and everything. They're, you know, they're ahead of the game on that. So he doesn't really come in and save anybody. But anyway, let's get into the character Matt Damon and, uh, you know, what he— what it was all about. So, uh, Matt Damon plays this— I guess he's kind of like this mercenary slash thief, you know, uh, who, you know, typical type mercenary character who only fights for money and fortune and fame and doesn't really fight for anything, uh, of importance, so to speak, anything of substance. Um, And so he's accompanied by, um, and whatever their names were in this movie, I have— I can't even remember. But we also had, uh, I believe his name is Pedro Pascal, but, um, we know him, Thrones, he played Prince Oberyn, you know. So we got, you know, y'all probably saw the trailers with, you know, Prince Oberyn in it. And, uh, also, you know, Willem Dafoe, you know, he's in the movie, but Anyway, Matt Damon, you know, again, him and Pedro, they play this mercenary task. And as the movie opens up, you know, they're fleeing from this band of bandits or something like that, or they've probably stolen something from them, or they've upset them some kind of way, so they're on horseback after them. And Matt Damon is looking for, you know, his character is looking for, uh, what they call black powder, which we know as gunpowder. You know, you know, Chinese through history, they had gunpowder and was using gunpowder, you know, thousands of years, you know, before it got to the West. So, you know, Matt Damon, and he's trying to get to it, take it back to Europe so he has a fortune. And things like that. But en route, you know, as they've gotten away from this group of bandits they've done something to, um, you know, they stopped to rest and, you know, um, you know, in the middle of night, they're attacked by this weird lizard-like creature. And, uh, Matt Damon is, uh, is able to, uh, take his sword and take a limb off this creature, he decides to, uh, you know, take the appendage of this creature with him so that if he, you know, he comes in contact with someone who may know what exactly it was, maybe they can, you know, you know, give him an explanation of, you know, what it is he just severed a limb on. And so, um, you know, the band has come back who, you know, were pursuing him in the beginning. And so Matt Damon and, you know, and Pedro again are on the move and They keep going and going until they get to the gates of the Great Wall of China. And, you know, at the gates, you know, as they're, you know, at these gates, um, uh, you know, the Chinese, uh, you know, army, they, you know, they're— they basically fired all these archers, uh, have fired all these, uh, warning shots of arrows and things like that. And the bandits are also afraid to keep, you know, to keep coming. So The bandits cut off their pursuit, let the Chinese deal with them. And so, uh, you know, as they're, you know, brought into the gates, um, the Chinese, uh, you know, Matt Damon, you know, shows the limb of the creature. And, um, you know, I, I, you know, basically it's looking like they're going to, uh, uh, you know, be imprisoned or something like that. But after they show the limb of this creature, it's found, they want to know, uh How in the world did they get that? Um, you know, how, how was Matt Damon able to defeat this creature or even stand against this creature? And Matt Damon explains that, you know, he did it by himself, but they don't believe it because, you know, apparently they know what type of creatures these are and they understand that, um, you know, basically that one person would never be able to stand against, you know, this type of creature. So You know, we get this, uh, uh, you know, uh, scene where before they can really take Matt Damon and Pedro to a proper cell, uh, these lizard creatures are en route to attacking them. So, um, they don't have time to do that. They actually have to take Matt Damon up on the wall, and, uh, they get to see these, you know, these lizard creatures as they're, uh, you know attacking the wall, trying to get over the wall. And so, um, uh, you know, it's, um, very interesting. You know, I, um, I'm a big fan of various types of armor, especially Chinese, Japanese, and things like that. So, you know, looking at this armor, um, I was kind of disappointed because I, I guess I wanted the armor to be more historically accurate. And, you know, they went for in this show a lot of pageantry and some of these, you know, the costumes like some superhero would wear just looked very, you know, fantastical. And I know it's supposed to be, you know, this type of movie, you know, I could see from the previews. And when I saw the previews I kind of looked at this movie and I was saying, oh yeah, this isn't, you know, this isn't gonna work. But you know, to my surprise, uh, you know, as I got into this movie, I can't say that if nothing else, this movie was quite entertaining. So it's a lot of entertainment in this movie. And so, um, I, I— it actually turned out to be a lot better than I thought it would be. But you know, back to the armor thing, the armor, you know, it just— it was all these various bright colors. And, you know, it was, uh, very fantasy-like armor, you know. It just— it didn't look anything like, uh, you know, what I know of the historical Chinese armor, how it would look. And so, uh, you know, they had all these strange fighting styles against these lizards, how they engaged them. These they were these— to explain these, these lizard-like creatures, they were like— you've probably kind of seen what they look like on the preview— they kind of look like Komodo dragons a little bit. And I was fine with that. I was also thinking, well, maybe these are like just really big Komodo dragons, which would make a lot of sense because some historical accounts talk about Komodo dragons being very large, you know. Even today, a Komodo dragon can be like 10 feet, but you know thinking like, uh, they'd probably do something like that. But, and they did kind of look like that, but then they also kind of looked very alien, you know. They had some crazy stuff going on with them, and I didn't much like that, you know. So, you know, so some, some, you know, some things, some designs and creature designs and different things like that, you know, and costume designs, various things like that, I didn't like. Also, uh, you know, in the movie they had where you guys probably seen them from the trailers, where they were— they're kind of like be strapped to these, uh, cables, and, uh, they would dive off the Great Wall. And what they would have is like these lances or spears in their hands, and as they, uh, descend down on the creatures, they would, you know, be stabbing them with these lances, and, uh, then they'll be, uh, retracted You know, and it was kind of, uh, um, uh, you know, uh, uh, just a very— I thought impractical battle strategy. But also, it— only women could do it. So they had this like army of just women. And, um, you know, because of their light body weight, I would assume they could easily be hoisted back up. And, uh, they was doing this. And I'm, you know, all through this movie, you're looking like, well, this very impractical. You know, who would come up with something like this? You know, looks kind of ridiculous. But, um, you know, although I didn't like that, there were some elements of the movie, some, um, military, uh, ideas and things that I did thought made a whole lot of sense. Like, um, you know, as the lizard swimming up the Great Wall, these slits in the wall, and, um, they would, uh, have these like scissor type, uh, shears or something that would just be slicing the lizards up, you know, that would, you know, come out of the side of the walls and slice them up as they climbed up. And to me, uh, you know, uh, that was actually a pretty good idea. I think even from a historical, uh, you know, military weapons and siege weaponry, or, uh, you know, um, uh, you know, protection against, uh, sieges or things, different things like that, uh, I think the weapon like how they show, you know, in this movie would have made a lot of sense. And I'm kind of surprised I didn't kind of see anything like that, you know, on the ancient stone walls they built. I do remember in like some castles they would of course have these slit holes in the castles where they could stick their bow and arrows out and they can shoot bow and arrows through these slit holes and hit the enemies without them themselves being exposed to any danger. And they could take out a lot of enemies like that. So that part I thought was a great idea and I found that interesting. Interesting about the movie. But, you know, we, we also get to find in the movie that a character played by Willem Dafoe, um, you know, he's already been there for like 25 years. Because the thing is, once they find out, once, you know, um, once, once you learn a lot of the secrets, you know, to the Chinese and things like that, they don't let you go home. So, you know, they keep all that, um, you know, they been behind the walls and you've seen certain things. So, you know, that's basically the plan with, you know, they're gonna— back then they've already done it to Willem Dafoe, who's been there for like 25 years. But some kind of way, they— these gentlemen, they, they, you know, they, they get all together and they, uh, start plotting to escape, but to escape with the black powder or the gunpowder. So they're trying to come up with this plan that during the lizard attack, or this, you know, these lizards attack, that they'll be fleeing, you know, and, and headed out while they are busy fighting off these, uh, creatures. You know, we also get to learn a little bit more about where the creatures came from, what are they. And it's just the story about this emperor who was very greedy thousands of years prior, I think about 2,000 years prior or something like that. And, uh, you may believe it came from the heavens, this a plague to deal with his greed. And it kind of comes down in an asteroid. So it looks like there's some type of aliens and they have these very alien-like features on them. And you know what their motivation is or what they're doing is their queen has to constantly feed so she can create more, you know, of them to keep them surviving and keep, I guess, their, you know, them going or what have you. But Apparently another thing is for some reason they only attack every 60 years. So every 60 years the Chinese have time to try to strategize a plan. They don't have time to build the Great Wall of China and all those different things. So that's what happens with that. But again, back to Willem Dafoe and Matt Damon. So they, they got this plan going, but you know, throughout the situation, Matt Damon kind of— the, um, the military commander who's, uh, played by this, uh, I, I can't remember her name, um, I had took some notes with some, but I can't— I seem to have lost the notes. But, uh, she, um, you know, she was a, uh, she was already like kind of commander of her little division because they have all these various divisions, different colored armor that do various things, like whether they're archers or the lancers they were, or, you know, or your present foot coming foot soldiers, whatever they were, you had your own type of armor. You know, one night, one of the lizard creatures gets through the wall, and, uh, the general, he's leading this like shield formation. It's kind of like the Roman turtle where they do the shields and they can all be protected by the shields. But the creature breaks it up, he slams into him, and then he's about to kill this, you know, this very cute Asian woman who, who's, you know, plays the commander of the Lance Corps, the people jumping off. And, uh, the general, you know, basically sacrifices himself to save her. But, you know, as he's dying, he makes her, you know, the commander you know, of their, you know, of their army. And so, you know, Matt Damon and this commander, you know, after she becomes like the general, what have you, you know, they've become, they've become, you know, you know, you know, very much interested in one another, I guess you could say, because, you know, Matt Damon, through his You know, while he's getting ready to be taken to sale on the first attack by the lizard-like creatures, you know, he's able to get a weapon. You know, they're able to free him so he can fight, and he fights pretty well. And so him and Prince Oberyn, or Pascal, they fight well enough to pretty much earn, you know, the respect of the Chinese through the fight, you know, in order to be set, you know, free. Uh, you know, at least not to be put in the jail cell. But, you know, they still can't leave, but they at least now are prisoners. And, uh, they kind of have this— I guess he's like a general, or he's kind of like the, uh, the, uh, you know, the, the scientist or the smart Chinese guy who figures out everything. And, uh, he's able to find that Matt Damon had been carrying around this, uh, this magnetic, you know, this mag— you know, this magnet, you know, this, uh, you know, that Matt Damon was actually using, you know, for as a compass. And they find out that, um, the magnet is what allowed Matt Damon to, uh, fight off this creature because apparently, you know, the queen of these lizard-like creatures, she communicates with them. They act as drones. They can only really function when she's giving them instructions. And she sends out this kind of sonic— I don't— it's like an— I'm assuming that she's somehow using the magnetic field because she has this kind of head, skeletal headpiece that vibrates. And I'm thinking that she's some kind of way sending this information through the magnetic field and that the magnet that Matt Damon possesses is disrupting that, and it disrupts it enough to where the creatures become confused and disoriented, and you can pretty much kill them then. So, you know, so this military commander, she's become interested in Matt Damon, and, you know, she wants to know more about, you know, more about him and who he is as a person. And, you know, she's trying to help him understand that the Chinese, that they fight for honor and you know, for noble causes, whereas Matt Damon is still in this mercenary type of, you know, mindset where he's still thinking about fighting for glory and money and things like that. So, um, you know, they don't kind of reach an area on the same page, but, you know, Matt Damon is obviously very interested in this character. So, you know, uh, we basically get, you know, to, uh, where the next attack comes, and Willem Dafoe and Pedro Pascal, they're planning their escape with the black powder, but they're kind of noticing that, you know, Matt Damon is getting really interested in this, uh, this military commander. He seems to be interested in their cause, and he doesn't— you know, they're concerned that He's not gonna, he's not gonna want to leave and steal the black powder and leave them to fend, you know, leave the Chinese lizard creatures themselves, you know. Although, you know, they've let them know what the stakes are, that if these creatures aren't stopped, they're going to spread to the rest of the world. So it won't just be the Chinese problem, it's going to be the rest of the world's problem. But, uh, you know, Pedro Pascal and Willem Dafoe, they're just thinking short term. They just want to get the, you know, get, you know, the money and, you know let come what may, you know. So, uh, but they, they're concerned that Matt Damon is not going to, uh, you know, going to, uh, join them and that he's not coming and he's not going to help them, which Matt Damon isn't, because Matt Damon has, you know, somehow throughout this situation found a cause, you know, found the cause to fight with these Chinese. He's their commander and he's kind of for the purpose, you know, he wants to, you know, be greater than what he's been, you know, throughout throughout his life. So, you know, he confronts his, uh, compadres, his comrades, and he sees, um, that, you know, they're going to steal this black powder. They're, they're not going to help the Chinese. So he tries to fight them to keep them there. He says he can't let them do that, but they, you know, they, you know, they're able to get the best of them and they take off with the black powder. The Chinese believes Matt Damon was in on it, so You know, they wanted the— you know, she's the military commander. She's, you know, she's thinking Matt Damon betrayed her, and so she wants to imprison him. But you know, Matt Damon had helped this, this young soldier, you know, earlier on in the movie, who actually, you know, didn't forget what Matt Damon did for him. So this young soldier kind of witnessed everything, and he kind of told the truth that Matt Damon was on their side trying to fight back. So they, uh, they let Matt Damon out. For the last attack. So in the last attack with these, you know, with these creatures, you know, they pretty much know about the magnet, that they can use that. And they're, you know, and they're fighting and the creatures are, you know, coming at them, but they only have that one magnet. And so they create this plan where they need to use the gunpowder and just kind of blow the creatures up. And they create this plan where they're gonna, you know, use balloons because, you know, they're— they kind of create this hot air balloon because You know, this is a, you know, for that time frame, I'm thinking it might be 14th century, something like that. You know, maybe around the Crusade times or right after. Uh, you know, the Chinese at this point in history are very advanced technology-wise, so they're probably the most advanced, uh, you know, culture on the planet, or one of them at this point in time. But, uh, so they got hot air balloons and they're flying around and they got the gunpowder and they're just kind of creating these grenades where they can destroy these lizard-like creatures. And, uh, you know, and very interesting how they do it. You know, like I'm saying about this movie, guys, if nothing else, it was a very entertaining movie. You know, it was a horror movie. I'm thinking, you know, I was gonna say, now I'll speak a little bit more about my overall thoughts on the movie at the end. But, um, you know, anyway, so Things don't go well for Willem Dafoe and Pedro Pascal because as this attack's going on, the Chinese have found a way to bomb these creatures from the air with hot air balloons. You know, Willem Dafoe and Pedro Pascal, you know, basically they're basically, you know, or I'm sorry, Pedro Pascal is basically betrayed by, you know, Willem Dafoe. And left stranded in the desert. You know, Willem Dafoe takes off with his horses, you know, whilst he's trying to scout out where to go next. And you know, Willem Dafoe already knows where to go, so he betrays him. Apparently he's going to take all the money and things for himself. And so Pedro Pascal actually ends up having to come back you know, as a prisoner, you know. And, um, uh, Willem Dafoe is captured by the— I believe the same bandits were after Matt Damon. So in short, it doesn't work out good for them trying to escape at all. And so, uh, you know, they're bombing and they're attacking, uh, uh, you know, these creatures. And the creatures are getting smart. They're finding a way to kind of shield and block from these various, you know, arrows and things like that. But, you know, Matt Damon, you know, his main skill was an archer. He was an archer. He was a very good archer, you know, in the trailers. You kind of see him and Pedro Pascal there tossing up, it looks like some cups or something like that. And he's able to knock the cup out of the air, then shoot arrows in time to kind of create this, uh, this holder for the cup to land on. And it's, you know, so he has great super-like human, you know, uh, you know, abilities with this, you know, bow and arrow. And so, you know, um, because these creatures have kind of found this, uh, strategy to shield themselves from the arrows with the gunpowder going in to try to blow them up. Uh, Matt Damon, you know, being a great archer, he's able to get his bow and arrow opening the creature's left open for the arrow to hit right in there and destroy the queen. Because, you know, it's like, it's like all these other movies where if you kill the queen, that serves the connection and all the drones just drop dead. When the Queen is dead, you know, so that's the same thing here. The creatures can't, you know, obviously live without the Queen. And so, you know, Matt Damon basically, uh, you know, is a hero now. He gets the— he gets— he gets two options, as you know, uh, Pedro at this point, his best friend, has been captured. And, uh, you know, he's going to be dealt with by the Chinese, and he's a prisoner of theirs now. But as Matt Damon is a hero to the Chinese, they grant him several requests and honors and gifts and things like that for him saving them. And so Matt Damon comes in to address Pedro at the end and lets him know, hey, I got the black powder. They said I could go with a fortune of the black powder. And Pedro's like, you know, I guess everything worked out for you. They have this banter back and forth. It's like a I told you so type banter, you know. And so he lets Pedro know, well, they gave me the option of I can take this powder and money and go back and be rich, or I can leave everything and just take you and we can go all free. And so it's kind of like Pedro was like, which one did you pick? And things like that. And so what I found interesting, I like that scene because it's kind of funny that, uh, the, the, the very thing that, uh, Pedro and Willem Dafoe, or rather Pedro was trying to convince, uh, Matt Damon not to do and trying to convince him of who he was, that he was the liar, that he was the thief, that he was the murderer, and he was the mercenary, only concerned about money, that the fact he turned out not to be those things was what saved Pedro Pascal's life. Or, you know, so I really like that scene. But anyway, uh, let me give my final thoughts on this movie. The movie turned out to be a lot better than I could ever have thought it would be. You know, I really— I was looking at the trailers and, you know, seeing them doing all this weird bungee jumping with the lances, which I still thought was a ridiculous battle strategy, and it was. I really thought the movie was gonna bomb, and the crit— and it has basically bombed. The critics are really slamming this movie, but I want to say that the movie's not as bad, you know, as they're, as they're saying is that, uh, the movie's turned out to be a lot better than I thought it was, that it was very entertaining. Uh, and then, you know, up until the end, it did kind of get— I did kind of— my eyes did get a bit heavy. Uh, they kind of— they could have kind of made this movie shorter. I think it's like 2 hours and something. It could have probably been an hour and 30 minutes, you know. But, um, and another thing, just a few other interesting things is, um, about this movie is that the person who plays, uh, Uh, well, I'm sorry, uh, this movie was made in China, and this was kind of like a partnership with China and Hollywood, or American, and, you know, big American actors like Matt Damon. And, uh, $150 million movie. So, uh, the movie, uh, you know, from China, that's probably one of the most expensive movies they made. So they're getting up there with that Hollywood caliber type movies. But, you know, I just want to say that at certain parts of the movie, I could kind of, you know, $150 million Sounds like a lot of money, but you know, compared to $250 million Hollywood budgets and far past north $200 million budgets and quality of film we're used to seeing now in Hollywood, this movie, uh, you can tell that it wasn't quite as up to par as those Hollywood type big budget movies. That I can tell it was $150 million movie. There were certain things about the movie it just, you know, looked, uh, you know, like, uh, we've seen better special effects years ago, uh, things like that. But all in all, I, I, it was an entertaining movie. It entertained me, so it's got to get points for that. And it, and it was shocking in that it entertained me more than I thought it would be. Again, uh, I didn't like the, the, that it wasn't historically accurate. Like, I wanted there to be a lot more because I'm a history buff and I was trying to see some things about Chinese history that I know from history. And this director who did this film, he was the same director who did Hero, the Jet Li movie with Hero. In fact, some of the Chinese are wearing— one of the Chinese, smart Chinese guy, kind of the advisor to the general or the kind of scientist guy, he was actually wearing a costume almost identical to the one Jet Li wore in Hero. You know, if you guys remember Hero years ago, that movie with Jet Li, it looks like it's about set in the same time frame or something. But, uh, uh, this was a fair movie. I mean, I'm, you know, I'm gonna, you know, it wasn't a great movie, it wasn't a good movie. I don't even know if it's worth, um you know, paying for a movie ticket unless it's just a weekend and you don't got anything else to do and you just kind of feel like going to the movies. I can kind of more or less see this being watched on DVD or Netflix, you know what I'm saying? Doesn't mean it's a bad movie because I'm saying that. I'm just saying, you know, movies are kind of expensive these days and, you know, I don't want to be like spending money, you know, unless it's, you know, I'm going to be getting a certain caliber of movie. But this was a popcorn movie. This was a fair movie. And, uh, guys, that's my review on it. Um, you know, uh, if you've seen the movie, uh, please, um, comment, let me know what parts you like, what parts you didn't like. Uh, let me know if you thought the movie just straight out sucked like some of the critics do. Uh, thanks for watching the video, guys. Don't forget to like and subscribe, and until next time, take care.