Domino

“A Copenhagen police officer, Christian (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau), seeks justice for his partner’s murder by ISIS member Imran. Determined to hunt Imran down, Christian and Alex (Carice van Houten), a fellow cop and his late partner’s mistress, are unwittingly caught in a deadly cat-and-mouse chase with a duplicitous CIA agent (Guy Pearce) who is using Imran as a pawn to trap other ISIS members. Their quest for revenge becomes a race against time to save their own lives.”

Domino, starring two seasoned Game of Thrones actors Nikolaj Coster-Waldau and Carice van Houten, directed by Brian De Palma, director of Scarface, The Untouchables, and Mission: Impossible; sounds like a recipe for some solid entertainment, right?

Well, you’d be severely mistaken.

Domino honestly has the setup of a decent plot: a cop film that takes place in Europe featuring terrorists. Sadly, the execution of the story leaves a lot to be desired, with almost every single aspect of the film failing to materialize. Writing is nearly non-existent, with the major plot involving a terrorist who kills Christian’s partner Lars (Søren Malling), but then is recruited by the CIA to help take down an even bigger terrorist who directs his followers to commit horrible atrocities and suicide bombings. Well, the ‘there’s bigger fish to fry’ deal isn’t going over too well with Christian, and since he somehow forgot his gun in the car when his partner was killed, he’s on a countdown until he’s rightfully suspended. Enter Alex, who’s role in this is a dismally executed B-Story of being Lars’ mistress. She really has no other reason to be there but to remind Christian of how his partner kept things from him. The two of them somehow manage to do a bit of police work and track down the main terrorist the CIA is after in hopes to trade him for Lars’ killer.

That’s about it, the film is relatively short, thankfully, but there is no kind of substance at all behind anything. These characters are entirely one-dimensional, with predictable and over-used tropes that only serve to bore the audience. Unfortunately, the actors don’t do well with what little they’re given, and it shows. This may be in part coming from such a rich background as Game of Thrones, but like it or not, these actors faced an impossible uphill battle delivering lines from this script. The antagonist, who you come to initially think is the man who killed Christian’s partner, shifts all of the sudden to the most generic Islamic terrorist you can imagine. There is nothing unique, nothing exciting, nothing to care about.

Some behind the scenes reports mention De Palma having difficulties with production filming overseas. However, this same report mentions De Palma admitting the film is exactly what he wanted it to be and despite the difficulties it’s his finished product. Come on, Brian, you had an out here. The action sequences are amateurish, with horrible choreography that looks sloppy and like Nikolaj Coster-Waldau doesn’t know how to work his own body. If action is what you’re seeking from the director of Mission: Impossible, look elsewhere.

All of this pales in comparison, however, to the icing on the cake of what makes this film basically unwatchable. The score. It looks like the composer Pino Donaggio has worked with De Palma on several of his other films, but I’m speechless as to how bad the music is in this film. Picture a cheesy soap opera that just has to have music playing at all times to fill the silence, only doesn’t match the tone of the scene whatsoever. Reading over reviews of the film after the fact this was one of the most mentioned missteps. What happened here guys?

I was rooting for this movie going into it. A chance to see these actors in something different, to see Brian De Palma create something fun and exciting, but it fails to do any of that. Where this exactly went wrong is hard to say because there is so much wrong in Domino.

Video

Domino is presented in 1080p High Definition Widescreen 1.85:1. The transfer on this looks great, with no issues of note. Color balance looks good with a crystal clear picture as well as some nice black levels  during the night sequences.

Audio

The audio is presented in DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1. On the technical side, the track sounds good, with some nice use of surrounds in some sequences, with a good balance between the surrounds and center channel. I won’t repeat my issues with the aforementioned score but simply want to re-iterate how its presence is a complete detriment to the film.

Special Features

There are no extras on the disc except trailers for other films.

Sadly, Domino doesn’t materialize into anything one could hope for in watching a film with this director and cast. For those who may be tempted by the thought of seeing their favorite Game of Thrones character in something different, there are definitely much better things you can seek out.