When it comes to lower budget film releases, the movie genre to probably have the most trouble looking anywhere near authentic is in the realm of science fiction. Most science fiction films today require a lot of heavy CGI and high tech gadgetry in order to look somewhat presentable for its genre and the audience viewing it. However, people tend to forget how ambitious their plans may be and the error of their ways ends up showing up in the end product. For this particular feature though, this is only one of a number of issues that is noticeable. Directed by Brian A. Miller, this would-be sci-fi thriller has a tough time throwing out any original ideas to the table that haven't already been used. Writers Andre Fabrizio and Jeremy Passmore (both San Andreas (2015)) don't seem to have a full grasp on what exactly they wanted the movie get across.

The story takes place in some undated future where a new society arises called Vice. Established by a man named Julian (Bruce Willis),Vice was created as an outlet for the public, so that for any fantasy they wanted to make for themselves was possible. That meant no laws, no government, no responsibilities and no consequences. Making sure that any acts of violence were performed humanely, the company made A.I. units who looked, acted and lived like normal human beings but underneath there was software and electronics. After one A.I. unit named Kelly (Ambyr Childers) begins having repeated flashbacks of past events, she flees with Vice security on her tail hoping that Kelly won't reveal to the public a unit became self aware. Also following closely behind is Roy Tadeski (Thomas Jane),a lone cop who's not too fond of Vice for generic reasons pertaining to the attitudes people end up adopting after leaving the facility.

Writing wise, it isn't the absolute worst but it isn't well thought out either. The screenplay tries to tackle a number of social and idealistic issues by borrowing ideas from older films like Westworld (1973),RoboCop (1987) and even The Purge (2013),but much of it is just underdeveloped and underplayed. The actors themselves are okay at best but you would figure, both Thomas Jane and Bruce Willis, who both have enough experience to act would make some kind of an impression. Thomas Jane has a couple of humorous moments in the film but much of it is just him mumbling through a toothpick. Willis is even more disappointing because his role really just feels like a call in. It would actually be more appropriate to say that Ambyr Childers as the rogue unit and Bryan Greenberg, who plays an important character in the plot, are far more interesting to watch than the two veterans previously mentioned. The story itself is not new but it can be tolerated. What isn't tolerated is how it was executed like a standard cat and mouse chase.

Because the majority of characters are quite predictable, there isn't much tension to be found among the scenes that have time constraining ordeals. Another aspect to this movie that isn't exploited properly are the sci-fi elements. Of everything described previously involving A.I. units and software, there is only one scene that looks remotely scientific. This involves rewiring a fuse inside a unit. The rest of the would-be science fiction like A.I. scenes are all done indirectly. An example of this is when Kelly receives an upgrade, which is done off screen. How disappointing - that's really trying to stretch the audiences' gullibility. The other major component that is sorely lacking any exploration is the paradise of Vice itself. The only thing audiences get to see in Vice are acts of murder, drinking and sex. Yeah these are pretty much the kinds of things most people would want to get away with, but with no laws wouldn't there be more to that? Surely someone would be more creative do something crazier than that, of which isn't it kind of the whole point?

Also how does a visitor to Vice know the difference between a human and a unit? There really wasn't any explanation given. The only science fiction like credit that can be given is the set production to the film. At least that looked somewhat apocalyptic in some respects and they didn't look cheap either. The shootouts are alright but nothing inventive. The part that worked against that however was the cinematography shot by Yaron Levy. There were two things Levy kept doing that will probably annoy the viewers. First, there are two many shots with dutch and other cockeyed angles. The second is that when Levy's camera is lateral, the camera keeps doing rotating 360 circumference shots. This is better than shaky camera by far but still frustrating at times. The film score however was better than expected. Composed by a trio of artists who call themselves Hybrid did an okay job. There was no main theme but they did have a number of tracks that worked, especially the ones involving Ambyr Childers and Bryan Greenberg. The thing I can't believe is that the filmmakers actually thought that this movie would get a sequel with an extremely obvious cliffhanger.

Its set production and music display decent quality with okay acting by the main cast but it's more of a time waster than it is worth a watch. The writing is below average, the camera-work is frustrating at best, the action is too standard and the science fiction elements are barely used for a story based on it.

The only good thing about Vice was the idea and that's about it. It's just too bad the script was so terrible because they could have done so much better with this movie. There are so many bad clichés in this movie it makes it almost comical. You have the highly trained guys with super modern machine guns that shoot about 100000 bullets and manage to hit one guy once at the end, and then you have the smart-ass cop with a toothpick in the corner of his mouth to make him look cool that has a stupid normal gun and that hits about everything he's shooting at. You have the usual bimbo's that have to lure more viewers. You have the well known actor (Bruce Willis in this case) that has to lure more viewers as well. But in Vice Bruce Willis just proves us he's not that of a great actor. Never was, never will be, just good enough for action movies a la Die Hard. The further you go in the story the more irritating it gets. It's just too bad the acting and the script were terrible otherwise you could have done something nice with the idea.

Saw 'Vice' because Bruce Willis has done good films and given good performances in the past and the idea for the story sounded interesting. Expectations were not high though, because Willis has been past prime for a while (several bad films and has looked tired and disengaged a lot) and having disliked his other outings with director Brian A.Miller, especially 'Reprisal'.

'Vice' is not a good representation of him, as a film it is down there as one of his worst and his own performance likewise. It fails dismally, faring very unfavourably in relation to other films seen in the genre, and while the idea was great 'Vice' manages to portray it with no thrills or imagination, complete with dull pacing, lots of silliness and endless predictability. Not hating it with pleasure, it's my honest opinion and my negative feelings towards it are regrettable.

Willis is used poorly, looks tired and like he didn't want to be there. Jonathan Schaech is stuck in a one-dimensional role that he overdoes in some places and underacts in others. They are nothing though next to a completely charisma free Thomas Jane spending the whole time looking completely disinterested and like he had not slept in days.

Visually, 'Vice' looks amateurish, the photography here some of the most disorganised, least stylish and self-indulgent for any film seen recently and the editing lacks cohesion. The music is too loud, should have been used far less and some of the placement is inappropriate. Brian A. Miller's direction is similar to that of an inexperienced rookie to the job, no personality and a lot of chaos and dullness.

Dialogue from the very start to the contrived climax is riddled with clichés and cheese and what little there is of the story has no surprises, fun or tension, is very pedestrian in pace and fails to make sense or have signs of maturity. It is good that it didn't take itself too seriously but 'Vice' goes overboard on the ridiculousness and lack of plausibility. The action is clumsily choreographed, sloppily edited and not exciting or suspenseful at all, as well as looking at least twenty years out of date. The characters are not compelling or easy to get behind. Do not expect every character in every film to be likeable when characters in numerous films purposefully aren't, but it is an issue if there are characters meant to be rootable and 'Vice' has that problem.

On the whole, awful. 1/10 Bethany Cox