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- 1998
- R
- 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment
- 1 h 56 m
- 1998
- R
- 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment
- 1 h 56 m
SummaryA political thriller, a cautionary fiction that is chillingly close to leading news stories of the day. (Fox)
Directed By: Edward Zwick
Written By: Lawrence Wright, Menno Meyjes, Edward Zwick
- 1998
- R
- 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment
- 1 h 56 m
- 1998
- R
- 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment
- 1 h 56 m
The Siege
53
6.6
My Score
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SummaryA political thriller, a cautionary fiction that is chillingly close to leading news stories of the day. (Fox)
Directed By: Edward Zwick
Written By: Lawrence Wright, Menno Meyjes, Edward Zwick
Where to Watch
Not available in your country?
ExpressVPN
Get 3 Extra months free
$6.67/mth
Top Cast
Metascore
Mixed or AverageBased on 25 Critic Reviews
53
32% Positive
8 Reviews
8 Reviews
60% Mixed
15 Reviews
15 Reviews
8% Negative
2 Reviews
2 Reviews
- All Reviews
- Positive Reviews
- Mixed Reviews
- Negative Reviews
Metascore
Mixed or AverageBased on 25 Critic Reviews
53
32% Positive
8 Reviews
8 Reviews
60% Mixed
15 Reviews
15 Reviews
8% Negative
2 Reviews
2 Reviews
- All Reviews
- Positive Reviews
- Mixed Reviews
- Negative Reviews
It's a thinking person's thriller, where pyrotechnics give way to plot, character development supplants fight scenes, and adrenaline does not short-circuit intelligence.
An intramural debate masquerading as an action movie.
By Gary DauphinFULL REVIEW
User Score
Generally FavorableBased on 41 User Ratings
6.6
51% Positive
21 Ratings
21 Ratings
46% Mixed
19 Ratings
19 Ratings
2% Negative
1 Rating
1 Rating
- All Reviews
- Positive Reviews
- Mixed Reviews
- Negative Reviews
User Score
Generally FavorableBased on 41 User Ratings
6.6
51% Positive
21 Ratings
21 Ratings
46% Mixed
19 Ratings
19 Ratings
2% Negative
1 Rating
1 Rating
- All Reviews
- Positive Reviews
- Mixed Reviews
- Negative Reviews
Just check out the date of production: 1998; three years before of 9/2001. New York menaced by fundamentalist terrorism, and two characters making the best for managing by opposite methods. The civil rights context is politically correct but it lacked of something to be more remarkable.
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The problem, as always, is that when you try to mix cliches with more complicated data it's often the cliches that win out.
The filmmakers peddle fear and then try to claim the moral high ground; the treatment is foolish, confused, and borderline irresponsible.
Most of the fault rests with the script, which gets to this issue late and feels only perfunctory, more interested in the jolt of the image than the jolt of the idea.
At some point, the movie itself crosses the line, from a modestly thoughtful attempt to extrapolate a drama from real and urgent events to a generic action piece with predictable good and bad guys and pat, civics-book morals.
In an attempt to be complex and fair-minded, a simple story becomes a jumble of confused motivations.
This film tells of a wave of terrorist attacks in New York provoked by Muslim terrorists. It debuted in 1998, but it could almost have been done yesterday, as current and pertinent as it is. The script mixes politics, military secrecy and terrorism, themes sinisterly close to our reality. I liked the way the film criticizes US because much of what is said in the film seems to resonate with what we have seen lately in the last twenty years. Terrorism is no longer a thing of some countries or regions: as in the movie, it can happen in our city and we have to live with it. As noted in the film, CIA made blunders in Middle East, which the world is now paying the bill. And the behavior of American military in the film doesn't lead us remember Abu Ghraib or Guantanamo? Everything in this film is sinisterly current. Another thing I liked: here almost there are no heroes. We all have our ghosts, gray areas, and sins to atone. The notion of "good guy" and "bad guy" is no longer valid in this film. Problems? The lack of reason for the terrorist attacks. There are fanatics blowing up bombs, but why? This could have been well explored, as it certainly would have been had the film been more recent.Actors do an OK job for most of the time, though none of them have actually been excellent. Denzel Washington has the most central character and is closest to the image of the good guy, but is a character too simple and flat. Annette Bening has the most psychologically intense and complex character, deserving applause for the way she did it, but ends up losing her brilliance by the way the film ends. Bruce Willis is the villain, in an open criticism of the American military's authoritarianism, but is a character so little explored and poorly developed that it looks like a caricature.The film was thought of as a thriller, and we actually feel the tension growing, but the ending is disappointing and predictable. There remain good political criticisms, although relatively lightly, and the sinister parallels of topicality I have mentioned.
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Très décevant de la part d’Edward Zwick qui fait souvent des films avec une certaine guimauve patriotique mais qui parvient à insufler un petit quelque chose d’épique, aussi maladroit et/ou naïf que cela puisse apparaître au spectateur (c’est en effet à l’insu du plein gré d’Edward).Rien de tel ici, on se croirait dans un épisode des Experts, NCIS ou je ne sais quelle série policière amerloque en carton. Le fait qu’il s’agisse d’une chasse aux terros ne change rien à l’affaire, ça reste incroyablement plat et générique : même les acteurs (mauvais ici bien sûr) n’y croient pas : ils se font chier autant que nous !… ou presque.
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