Paranoia

I had initially decided to join the world's unofficial boycott of Paranoia (the movie made $7 million against a $35 million budget), but then I saw it had a 4% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.  While I find Rotten Tomatoes' ranking system a bit flawed, I felt that something this bad needed to be seen.

Paranoia is not a good movie, but it's not 4% bad.  It's a story about a young man who works for an electronics company.  After a failed software pitch gets him and his friends fired, he is offered the chance (by his recently former boss) to engage in corporate espionage at his former boss' rival's company.  Despite it being highly illegal, he agrees because he's being paid thousands of dollars, is being blackmailed with the threat of going to prison for credit card fraud (which he totally committed), has been threatened with the murder of himself and his family and friends, and also some girl he had a one night stand with a week ago works there.  Using his technological know-how and a hefty dose of hard work and dedication, he must topple both corporate giants and restore our faith in the American Dream.

 

Paranoia tries so hard to be relevant.  The anti-corporate message is incredibly heavy-handed.  The movie beats you over the head with the state of the American workforce.  Every other sentence seems to reference "the American Dream being stolen from us" or "one-percenters."  But the writers weren't done.  They knew they could be even more relevant.  So, they squeeze in a bunch of nonsense discussions about the problems with health care and even a little about how cell phones distance us from other people.  But it's all just words.  None of these "themes" is actually given any importance.  If none of these issues were brought up, it wouldn't change the story in the slightest.

 

Same with the best friend and his girlfriend characters.  They are in this movie only to be threatened.  These roles should've been cut, and we would all be spared some of the film's worst dialogue.  They have zero real impact of the outcome of the movie.

 

Gary Oldman is pretty good in this.  The man is brilliant, and he probably can't help but make a decent performance out of his lines.  Harrison Ford needs to stop being in movies.  He doesn't even try anymore.  Amber Heard is super bland, which is par for the course.  And then there's the star of the movie: Liam "The Lesser" Hemsworth.  He is trying so hard to be a leading man, but I don't think he's got it.  When he and Amber Heard are onscreen together, I felt like I was watching the CW.

 

Paranoia aims to be both a gripping techno-thriller and a message movie about the state of modern America.  Both of these goals are handled about as deftly as one would expect from a director who specializes in romantic comedy.  This movie is directed by the same guy as Legally Blonde, Monster-In-Law, and The Ugly Truth and it shows.  It even has a saccharine, romantic happy ending.  But with a moral: accept being poor and then you'll get rich.

 

I don't recommend it (both the movie and acquiescing to poverty).

 

3 out of 10