Read Mixed User Reviews for The Great Wall

4

jamessMay 30, 2017

The Great Wall may be the most beautiful piece of hokum I've ever seen. Yimou Zhnag, best known for Jet Li's Hero, nails the cinematography, costume and set design. All are excellent. But they threw 150 million and a lot of talented techThe Great Wall may be the most beautiful piece of hokum I've ever seen. Yimou Zhnag, best known for Jet Li's Hero, nails the cinematography, costume and set design. All are excellent. But they threw 150 million and a lot of talented tech people to basically tell a "under siege with monsters" movie. Remember Feast (or numbers 2 or 3?)? This is the 150 million dollar ancient Chinese version. The two travelling leads banter like an eighties buddy cop movie, even though it's the year 1200 or something. Even Willem Defoe is wasted. Given the location (the Chinese scenery is again, beautiful), and time frame, think one word, monster?.....dragons? Nope. Some lizardy-dog type creatures that fail to look convincing. The "predator-dogs" in Predators looked better. At least it was fairly short.… Expand

3 of 3 users found this helpful30

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4

JarodyJan 7, 2018

There is absolutely nothing in this film that differentiates it from any other typical action movie out there. With the cringe-worthy dialogue, awfully written story and completely bland and uninteresting characters it surprises me that itThere is absolutely nothing in this film that differentiates it from any other typical action movie out there. With the cringe-worthy dialogue, awfully written story and completely bland and uninteresting characters it surprises me that it hasn't gotten a lot more hate. So despite Matt Damon's decent performance and good cinematography and special effects "The Great Wall" is just another stereotypical action movie snore fest.… Expand

1 of 1 users found this helpful10

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6

WorldofLuckyFeb 3, 2018

I was surprised, I was definitely surprised.

I wouldn't call The Great Wall a "great movie". It is a niche genre piece mixing a big of Hong Kong fighting with some fantasy type action. I was really hesitant about the movie though. A ChineseI was surprised, I was definitely surprised.

I wouldn't call The Great Wall a "great movie". It is a niche genre piece mixing a big of Hong Kong fighting with some fantasy type action. I was really hesitant about the movie though. A Chinese movie, set in a "vaguely" historical China with what I was worried would be the "Great White Hope". However it wasn't like that at all. In fact there was a subtle (or not so subtle) reversal of that.

Instead of him saving everyone, he is saved by them. The movie portrays the greed of capitalism as bad, and the rich elite as just useless. Instead it is those who serve selflessly who are revered in the movie. Definitely Chinese politics are involved in the movie, but maybe I am not so different with my outlook that I found it an overall good message.

Matt Damon is pretty good in the movie as the angry, greedy white boy from the crusades, with Pedro Pascal as his sidekick (you may know him as Oberyn Martell from Game of Thrones) who is even more greedy. They are met by one other white person, William Defoe as a very back stabbing kind of capitalist merchant as well. Matt Damon changed over the course of the movie, Pedro changed maybe a little, and Dafoe did not (and suffered for it).

While those actors were as good as to be expected I absolutely loved Jing Tian (she is also starring this year in Kong: Skull Island, and Pacific Rim 2). True she didn't speak a lick of English, but she still portrayed a real badass, and had an intensity. Since I am seeing both of her other movies, I am excited to see her in those.

Overall though the movie was pretty good. People complained about the CGI, but I didn't notice too much. People said it was really colorful, such as the uniforms, sadly my colorblindness means I missed that part, but I still liked it.

However, all that said, it was an ok movie. Not super great, but definitely not as bad as people had said it would be.

The good: action sequences were good, Ms Tian was good, and it was entertaining.

The bad: It is popcorn material, you will forget about it within a few weeks (or sooner) and the political message was a little ham handed.… Expand

1 of 1 users found this helpful10

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4

ipeedailyFeb 22, 2017

The special effects and imagery were fantastic (esp. in 3D)but the movie went way overboard with the premise and the almost superhuman abilities of its "heroes" in being victorious....add in dopey dialogue (with some attempts at humor turningThe special effects and imagery were fantastic (esp. in 3D)but the movie went way overboard with the premise and the almost superhuman abilities of its "heroes" in being victorious....add in dopey dialogue (with some attempts at humor turning out humorless) and Matt Damon apparently going for some kind of foreign affect to his speech (only winding up in him sounding clueless anytime he opened his mouth) and it turns out a very mediocre movie with too many "oh, c'mon" moments. 4 out of 10… Expand

4 of 5 users found this helpful41

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4

MiguelSoares14Apr 17, 2017

Overrated movie, unfortunately. The plot is too simple and the characters aren't impressive at all. The visual effects are good but everything around it is weak.

2 of 3 users found this helpful21

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4

eagleeyevikingFeb 17, 2017

Despite the non-stop action and great visuals thanks to the remarkable talent on and off the screen, The Great Wall is disappointingly empty in terms of plot, character development and drama.

7 of 11 users found this helpful74

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6

TVJerryFeb 17, 2017

Matt Damon and Pedro Pascal play 2 mercenaries looking for gun powder in historical China. When they're caught and imprisoned in the titular structure, they end up in assault by a horde of vicious mythical beasts. This film was directed byMatt Damon and Pedro Pascal play 2 mercenaries looking for gun powder in historical China. When they're caught and imprisoned in the titular structure, they end up in assault by a horde of vicious mythical beasts. This film was directed by noted Chinese director Yimou Zhang and he's put his eccentric style all over the film. The battles are over the top (pun intended) with dizzying action and video game visuals. The plot is somewhat silly, while the human interaction is mundane. If you appreciate fantastic imagery, hyped up fights and spectacular scenery, this somewhat stylized adventure will not disappoint.… Expand

5 of 8 users found this helpful53

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5

NotoriousFraudFeb 19, 2017

Matt Damon's new star vehicle "The Great Wall" left very little of an impression on me. The writing, the acting, and even the cgi effects leave much to be desired.

4 of 7 users found this helpful43

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4

KaptenVideoMar 21, 2017

Middle Ages or something. European mercenaries (Matt Damon, Pedro Pascal) searching for black powder become embroiled in the defense of the Great Wall of China against a horde of monstrous creatures. Also starring: Tian Jing, Willem Dafoe.Middle Ages or something. European mercenaries (Matt Damon, Pedro Pascal) searching for black powder become embroiled in the defense of the Great Wall of China against a horde of monstrous creatures. Also starring: Tian Jing, Willem Dafoe. Directed by Yimou Zhang.

China is an attractive movie market for Hollywood and they are also eager to spend money on making international hit movies, so uniting forces to produce some epics is an emerging trend. The American production values plus a leading star or two, combined with Chinese money, actors and locations – what could go wrong?

Well, in the case of „The Great Wall“, almost everything. It’s 103 minutes of almost non-stop action so it may appeal to some, especially it (s)he hasn’t had enough of Tolkien-flavored epics populating the screens for the last 15+ years. But for others, it’s lazily written, acted and put together B-movie which has high aspirations but is too dumb and derivative to achieve that. There’s almost no story, or interesting characters. Even the massive action scenes don’t save much, more often than not the result just looks cheap. Even surprisingly cheap, considering the hefty budget of 135-150 million US dollars. This is the most expensive film ever made with (mostly) Chinese money.

The only impressive thing is how orchestrated the defending side looks, all those color-coded legions, weapons, the whole shebang. It’s probably done with a lot of CGI but still… not bad.

I also think the whole „monsters raiding Chinese Wall“ aspect is woefully underdeveloped and, in a bad way, videogame-ish. They don’t have much personality design-wise and making them so strong raises more important questions than the story bothers to answer. In short, the work here is weak.

Matt Damon has the only noteworthy role in the whole movie, all others are filler. And even he can not make a character so shallow especially convincing. Damon is one of those top class stars who appears in lots of movies but, as a rule, avoids derivative crap. „The Great Wall“ is probably the worst big project he has ever done. The sooner it’s forgotten, the better for everybody.

If you are interested in „The Great Wall“, maybe just watch the trailer and save 100 minutes of your life. The movie sucks. You will feel tired after twenty minutes or so. Watched it in 2D, so maybe 3D version sucks even more.… Expand

2 of 4 users found this helpful22

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6

Rix397Apr 26, 2017

Good performances by Matt Damon, Pedro Pascal & Jing Tian, good action, good visuals and good soundtrack sadly aren't enough to make this movie "good". Full of predictability and cliches, uncompelling characters and bland faceless villains,Good performances by Matt Damon, Pedro Pascal & Jing Tian, good action, good visuals and good soundtrack sadly aren't enough to make this movie "good". Full of predictability and cliches, uncompelling characters and bland faceless villains, "The Great Wall" isn't a fun, exciting adventure as one would hope, but it will likely entertain the least demanding moviegoers.… Expand

1 of 2 users found this helpful11

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5

EpicLadySpongeFeb 17, 2017

China, look amazed because your "Great Wall" has a feature film of its own. If the people in China would actually look at this film more and more, they'd recognize that this Great Wall film is just a plain boring "kill the monster before itChina, look amazed because your "Great Wall" has a feature film of its own. If the people in China would actually look at this film more and more, they'd recognize that this Great Wall film is just a plain boring "kill the monster before it takes over our land" cliché. Hey, at least they tried and that's a great thing to see.… Expand

3 of 9 users found this helpful36

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6

RtheomFeb 23, 2017

It's an alright movie. If you don't go in expecting anything more than campy action, you'll do fine enough. It's definitely not one you should rush out to the theaters to see, but you'd do well catching this on Netflix or TV while doingIt's an alright movie. If you don't go in expecting anything more than campy action, you'll do fine enough. It's definitely not one you should rush out to the theaters to see, but you'd do well catching this on Netflix or TV while doing something else. I've definitely seen worse this movie season.… Expand

1 of 3 users found this helpful12

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5

Muskrat147Mar 4, 2017

Trying (and failing) at creating an "epic", Yimou Zhang's The Great Wall has far too many unintentionally laughable moments, and settles for limited spectacle and poorly conceived characters.

1 of 3 users found this helpful12

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5

LucascastawayApr 14, 2017

Visual do filme em certos momentos e bom e em muitos momento são toscos , da pra perceber em muitos momentos que e tela verde , os proprios 'Bixos' parecem uma animação mal feita / roteiro não se perde tanto / 3D não e muito utilizado / naVisual do filme em certos momentos e bom e em muitos momento são toscos , da pra perceber em muitos momentos que e tela verde , os proprios 'Bixos' parecem uma animação mal feita / roteiro não se perde tanto / 3D não e muito utilizado / na minha opinião uma historia fraca Emfim Filme blockbuster ( na minha opiniao )
mais vale a pena assisti !… Expand

1 of 3 users found this helpful12

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5

marcmyworksFeb 28, 2017

The Great Wall has style, great sets, great choreography and elaborate costumes but unfortunately no originality and a basic plot line. Tie this in with subpar acting and you've got a film that could have been great, but wasn't.

1 of 5 users found this helpful14

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5

MeritCobaNov 21, 2017

This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. This is a movie that pairs spectacular visuals and well done choreography with a weak story and shallow characters. But let's not go into that, but instead let's have a look at what sixty years of preparation for the eventful onslaught has given the defenders. For the Chinese defenders know that every sixty years these monsters make an attack and once that succeeds the whole world is at their feet.. eh claws.

Your enemy is a reptilian dog hybrid that is the size of a draft horse. It comes with claws, teeth and a thick hide, can stand an amazing amount of punishment and is suicidally loyal to their queen. One such monster can easily take out a group of well-trained and armed humans. The creatures have however a few severe weaknesses: killing their queen will stop them from functioning, confronting them with magnets will make them docile and hitting their eyes is an instant kill. And the defenders have one big advantage: they have gunpowder at their disposal.

So armed with knowledge about a weakness for magnets the Chinese defenders neglect to send out people all over the world to find magnets or even use the one magnet that stopped the monsters in a previous assault. Instead they use ineffectual methods until saved by this one random traveler who is carrying around a massive magnetic stone that serves no purpose to him and is there only to be delivered into the hands of the Chinese as a lapis ex Machina. And even when the Chinese are aware of the stone's effect on the monsters no messengers are send out to the far corners of the empire to collect whatever stones can be found. To add insult to injury, they even take away the one stone from the wall to show it to the emperor. And what happened to that stone that saved the day sixty years before? And why was it not examined back then?

The queen is the Achilles heel and the defenders only make a half hearted attempt to take her out. She is protected by a group of special monsters that can create a kind of shield to protect her from attacks, which is put up exactly the few times the defenders make an attempt to kill her.
She gets bombarded once and then when that defensive shield is put up they give up. Conveniently at the end of the movie the shield is put down to give Matt Damon a window of opportunity even when the queen knows someone is firing at her. And this several times over. Yes, these monsters have become smarter, as the movie has it, but only by a margin as compared to humans.

And this shows again the sheer stupidity of the defenders. They have had sixty years to prepare for the onslaught and could have created a massive supply of gunpowder weapons aimed to take out the queen. -And note that even a few arrows with gunpowder are apparently very effective against the monsters -. Couple this with oil canisters and naphtha flame throwers they could have killed her by blowing her up or burning her to death. But instead they rely on arrows, swords and spears. It isn't that the monsters have become smarter, the humans have become dumber.

But even if they did not possess gunpowder and magnets then it is baffling what preparations they made in sixty years. For instance the monsters are apparently able to scale the wall. So why put up a flat wall that can easily be scaled instead of equipping the wall with defensive measures against scaling such as barbs that point downwards? Why is the wall not equipped with extensions as to rain down boiling water or fire? Why are the ballistae put on top of the wall but not on level with the monsters so as to have them fire in a level trajectory optimizing the chance of hitting something? Why is the foreground of the wall not used to create obstacles, pits, stakes, traps and a moat instead of allowing the monsters free range of that area? Even putting up beams spaced out to allow room for humans but to narrow for these hulking brutes would have broken up their attack and allow the defenders protection.

Perhaps it is because the wall, as cool as it looks, was not made to defend against these monsters but against the tribes? But most baffling of all. Why did the monsters bother with attacking the Chinese when they could just as easily move to any other part of the world that lack this defensive construction?

The movie would have made a lot more sense if the Chinese had not known about these monsters. Then the lack of proper countermeasures would have made a lot more sense. The wall was made to keep out the steppe people, not massive deadly beasts. Yes, I know.. The movie has to be spectacular. But couldn't they not have put some effort into it to make it also more logical? Now it feels like the Chinese are just stupid and require a foreigner to save the day. Oh yeah, an American foreigner.… Expand

0 of 1 users found this helpful01

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5

CineAutoctonoFeb 17, 2017

"The Great Wall" was a regular movie, the story was regular, the special effects were good but exceeded, cinematography was fairly regular, and I did not care that Matt Damon is a samurai of pure autonomy. But his very good role, also the"The Great Wall" was a regular movie, the story was regular, the special effects were good but exceeded, cinematography was fairly regular, and I did not care that Matt Damon is a samurai of pure autonomy. But his very good role, also the roles of Pedro Pascal and Jiang Ting, the revelation of China in Hoillywood.… Expand

0 of 6 users found this helpful06

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6

daviddelnorte23Feb 20, 2017

Lo primero decir que, la gran muralla es una mala película, pero que como pelicula de entretenimiento, cumple.Para nada aburre. Hay mucha acción, humor y un toque aventurero.

El desarrollo de personajes es malo, aún así el personaje de MattLo primero decir que, la gran muralla es una mala película, pero que como pelicula de entretenimiento, cumple.Para nada aburre. Hay mucha acción, humor y un toque aventurero.

El desarrollo de personajes es malo, aún así el personaje de Matt Damon está bien desarrollado, no se puede decir lo mismo del personaje de Pedro Pascal al cual parece que solo le han contratado para hacer chistes. Aún así esta pareja funciona. El personaje de William Dafoe, un desperdicio.

Los diálogos son ridiculos hasta decir basta, un guión flojo y una efectos visuales bien, sin más.

En definitiva, buena película para evadirse una hora y cuarenta y cinco minutos.… Expand

0 of 2 users found this helpful02

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6

BITESCREENJun 21, 2017

Irgendwann um die Erfindung des Schießpulvers: Auf der Suche nach Ruhm und Reichtum stranden zwei Söldner und Tagediebe in der Chinesischen Mauer. Deren Existenz ist noch geheim – und damit das auch so bleibt, werden die beiden unfreiwilligIrgendwann um die Erfindung des Schießpulvers: Auf der Suche nach Ruhm und Reichtum stranden zwei Söldner und Tagediebe in der Chinesischen Mauer. Deren Existenz ist noch geheim – und damit das auch so bleibt, werden die beiden unfreiwillig Dauermieter. Langweilig wird es jedoch nicht, denn der vierbeinige Urfeind des ansässigen Kriegerordens attackiert in Scharen das mächtige Bollwerk. Selbstredend erkämpft man sich schnell den Respekt seiner Gastgeber – und die Zuneigung des schnuckeligen Commanders Lin Mai. Doch macht das die Isolation auf Lebenszeit wett? Schon Tom Cruise mimte in The Last Samurai erfolgreich und unterhaltsam den Weißasiaten, in der Fantasy-Action The Great Wall übernimmt jetzt Matt Damon den Job. Das ist zwar in allen Belangen stumpfer, macht aber durch ordentlich Tempo und eine gute Prise Culture Clash und Buddycomedy immer noch Spaß – auch wenn der Martial-Arts-Part trotz Hero– und House of Flying Daggers-Regisseur Zhang Yimou eher klein ist.… Expand

0 of 1 users found this helpful01

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5

TyranianApr 9, 2019

Mildly enjoyable but mostly quite dodgy. Mainly in the megadumb department.