Echelon Conspiracy (2009)

Director:

Greg Marcks

Writers (WGA):

Michael Nitsberg (screenplay) and
Kevin Elders (screenplay) ...

Release Date:

12 March 2009 (Kazakhstan)

Genre:

Action | Mystery | Thriller

Tagline:

Security comes at a price...

Plot:

At first, the strange phone messages promised great wealth. Soon, though, government agents pursue the young engineer receiving them around the world.

Plot Keywords:

Casino | Czech Republic | Security Camera | Man Crushed By Car | Face Slap

Cast

  (Cast overview, first billed only)

Shane West	...	Max Peterson
Edward Burns	...	John Reed
Ving Rhames	...	Agent Dave Grant
Jonathan Pryce	...	Mueller
Tamara Feldman	...	Kamila
Yuriy Kutsenko	...	Russian General
Sergey Gubanov	...	Yuri Malanin
Martin Sheen	...	Raymond Burke
Ilan Goodman	...	Dennis
Todd Jensen	...	Agent Fletcher
Steven Elder	...	Charles
Sandra De Sousa	...	Female Casino Tech
Greg Donaldson	...	Casino Tech
Andrea Enright	...	NSA Tech #2
Trevor White	...	Paul Spencer

Also Known As:

The Gift (Australia) (DVD title) (USA) (working title)
The Conspiracy (Singapore: English title)

MPAA:

Rated PG-13 for sequences of intense violence and action, some sexuality and brief language.

Runtime:

105 min

Country:

USA

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

USA:PG-13 (certificate #44815) | South Korea:15 | Singapore:PG | Philippines:R-13 (MTRCB) | Netherlands:16 | Germany:16

Filming Locations:

Bangkok, Thailand

Company:

After Dark Films

Goofs:

Continuity: When Echelon shuts itself down we see the computer racks in the back shutdown but when the 3 guys are arrested in the next scene they are back on.

Quotes:

[first lines]
Curator: Everything okay down there?
Max Peterson: Piece a cake.
Curator: That locks it?
Max Peterson: Yep, centuries of Thai history, safe as Fort Knox. Watch, uh,
[removes a panel]
Max Peterson: Relax, I'm a professional.
Max Peterson: [causes a massive short] Okay, now your servers are down because of a power surge, a grid malfunction, or maybe even a bomb. Now, if the intruder tries to reboot your servers or access the data, he'll always hit this screen.
[login screen]
Max Peterson: This is your BIOS-level password. Without it, nothing works in this room.
[...]

Movie Connections:

Featured in "The Rotten Tomatoes Show: Echelon Conspiracy/Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun Li/Crossing Over (#1.1)" (2009)

BETTER than Eagle Eye

No, this was not a great movie, action movies rarely are, but it was certainly better than Eagle Eye.

Common complaints:

-"The acting sucked": Who the hell cares? It's an action movie! At least the characters were interesting and developed. At least the love interest was more than just a pretty girl along for the ride.

-"The plot was confusing and I couldn't figure out if they were good or bad guys": OMG! You are the stupidest idiot alive! You're the reason they dumbed down MI2. You are never aloud to watch a suspense movie again. If you said that the plot had too many detours, holes, or didn't explain itself right, I'm sorry, but you obviously just couldn't follow it. It all fit together in a neat little package.

-"The plot was too predictable": You also seem to be the folks that complain that the movie copied Eagle Eye. Do you really think that Eagle Eye had a good plot? =Jump through hoops or I'll kill you! By the way, I need your face or I'm blowing up a diamond.= That's not a plot! That's a really long car chase with gratuitous special effects. The plot only seems predictable because you've heard the story before. Standing alone it was interesting and well executed. They went about it far better than Eagle Eye here too. How long am I expected to listen to Shia LaBeouf whine that he doesn't want to play along!? Phone lady can kill you dude! Do what she says! At least Echelon was a smarter computer than Eagle Eye and bribed you first.

-"The end was cliché": Yeah alright you got me there. But once again...ACTION MOVIE! There was limited computer cliché amidst awesome gun fight and car explosion! Then he walks away with the girl...DUH! Complain about this and you complain about 99% of action suspense movies.

-"Unbelievable suspension of reality regarding computer technology": Uh...yeah. If you can't make this leap then you don't have any business watching a movie with "conspiracy" in the title. What do you want? A prologue that says "It must be understood that the computer is omniscient"? If you don't get the reference then you're not aloud to review movies anymore.