The Adjustment Bureau

[tpfkabi]

From that description it could just be an underground FBI type organization (even Bureau in the title).

It just didn't sound Sci-Fi to me, that's all. Now if it turns out there are some chips embedded in people's brains (the part in the trailer that shows hand held scanning devices that look similiar to present day airport security) and that's how they track them, etc, then it feels PKD to me. I'm not familiar with this story though.

[children with angels]

You're right in the sense that it doesn't seem to be strictly sci-fi, but still - there's no way this organisation is anything that can be explained realistically, so it's maybe best called fantasy. PKD always walks that balance anyway, and this is definitely a metaphysical/philosophical plot based around similar concepts to those he explored ad nauseum elsewhere... Free will vs predetermination,  Plato's cave, etc.

I'm still anticipating that they've got the tone wrong though.

[Pozer]

i ever tell you fellers my former abode was just down the street from the apartment complex (in Fullerton, CA) where Philip K. Dick attempted to off himself 3 different ways in one sitting? no one cares in my real life either but knowing that was the place where out his Philip K. Dick head to paper went VALIS and A Scanner Darkly has been a great inspiration to me. i live in the next town over now but pass by there all the time and still hang out in bars he did and still cant believe of all places in the world the O.C. is the area that dude ended up in.

anyways this is all i got on this movie as of now.

[Pozer]

hey Pozer maybe stop posting your nerdy personal thoughts on real life stuff nobody here or in real life could possibly give a shit about!

[Pas]

hey Pozer maybe stop posting your nerdy personal thoughts on real life stuff nobody here or in real life could possibly give a shit about!

these are good stories pozz 

[Pozer]

aw shucks, thanks Passers  >blush<

you wann..you wanna hear bout the time i pulled skeet for Lucas and his buddies?

[Stefen]

I DO!

[Pas]

Wait I had forgotten about this thread already, I would've jumped on it!!! GO ON!

[Pozer]

i'd forgotten too. Lucas thing was half a joke. . the thought of this barely notable encounter came from when i was in hikeschool i used to work at this trapshooting range in Irwindale, CA he came in friend of mine actually did the skeet pulling i only saw him and his buddies firing. all i remember is he was flanneled up he tipped my friend a hundred bucks and everyone else thought he was Steven Spielberg . . .

not that interesting.

oh he did use a Han Solo scaled blaster and instead of clay targets he demanded proximity mines be discharged from the trap machine.

p.s. The Adjustment Burewho?

[Reel]

besides the fact that this is from a PKD story, it just seems like such an Inception rip-off. They're obviously riding on that wave of
subconscious altering for the sake of a crime thriller story that it left behind. I mean, there's nothing wrong with that- maybe I'll even get through this one without falling asleep, but how can you put out something like this in the wake of such a huge hit and expect it to be anything but subpar?

[I Love a Magician]

looks more like a high-end version of The Box than inception

EDIT: a point that i made back in may. i'm getting old.

[Stefen]

I actually think this was supposed to come out BEFORE Inception. I know it's been pushed back awhile so it probably had nothing to do with Inception and how overrated it has gotten.

Looks pretty silly, actually. Certainly not as exciting as Inception, which is sure to end up being underrated.

[modage]

from my blog:

When I saw the trailer for "The Adjustment Bureau" I thought that it looked like Hollywood had attempted to fuse a Philip K. Dick sci-fi story with a romantic subplot. After seeing the film it seems almost to have been engineered the opposite way: a romantic drama with a silly science fiction conceit keeping the lovers apart. The film is primarily a love story between Matt Damon's politician and Emily Blunt's ballerina, only instead of an ex-boyfriend or a secret keeping them apart, it's a team of 'Adjusters'. The idea explored here is that everyone has their path in life and when someone strays too far from their path a team of 'Adjusters' come in and help set you back on track.

Because Damon's politician has a shot at President, he isn't supposed to be with Blunt's freewheeling ballerina so the team (led by Anthony Mackie, Terrence Stamp and the always amazing John Slattery) do everything they can to keep the pair apart. But the pair, despite having only met a few times, are determined to be together. It's an interesting way to explore the "we were meant for each other" angle, but when you get around to explaining the "magic hats" (seriously) the whole thing gets pretty silly. Despite some (unintentional?) awkwardness during their early scenes, Damon and Blunt share some decent chemistry together but some of the silliness make it more of a Netflix steaming lazy Sunday film. Entertaining, forgettable.

[SiliasRuby]

I may be alone when I say this but I really enjoyed this film. Its a deeply flawed film but I generally admired what they were trying to do. Matt Damon has a certain charisma that cannot be matched and Emily Blunt is always good.

[RegularKarate]

Oh man, I wish I hadn't already submitted my Xixax nominations for worst movie.  This thing was so awful.

Take the flattest, least believable romance (we are just supposed to believe these two are immediately madly in love with one another based on Damon being a little bit charming in one scene) add a VERY complicated sci-fi/fantasy element then remove all the logic and ideas that make that complicated idea interesting.  Now it's just a bunch of guys in hats chasing Matt Damon.  Once you get to the end, your jaw may drop at not only how insanely, laughably predictable the ending was, but how quickly and lazily they tied everything up.

I was laughing at the movie a lot during the last thirty minutes.  They set up the most ridiculously dumb ideas and then forget the "rules" to the world they just created.

If they whole movie were as hilariously bad as the last thirty minutes, I'd recommend it to people, but it's pretty damned boring for the first hour.