I am only giving this movie a 1 for the great cast, though I can't imagine what any of them were thinking. This movie was horrible

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

I'm not one for NZ movies to begin with and this came in a 4 pack of DVDs containing one movie I wanted, so I wasn't aware the cast was pretty much straight out of Shortland Street - believe me, once you've seen someone on that poor excuse of a programme it's hard to take them seriously in anything else. It was ridiculous seeing the now decommissioned Arahura as a cruise ship in America with a mainly NZ cast and the name of the ship not even covered for filming - seriously, did they think people couldn't see the name and wouldn't realise that it was different to what the ship was meant to be called???? I actually laughed out loud when I saw it then turned it off! I feel sorry for the main American lead having to film with such amateurs - it must have been an excruciating experience. If they allowed you to give less than a 1-star rating I would have because it's not even good enough for 1-star.

There is only one problem with this website, you can't give a negative rating. Additionally a mate rated this as a D grade movie. I say he was being too nice. A piece of wood could show more emotion that the actors in this movie, and the money used to produce this movie would have been better used to start a fire. This is absolutely terrible, 2 hours of life that anyone who endures this untalented bloodbath will never get back. After watching 5 minutes, myself and the boys wondered if sinking bulk heavies would make this anymore entertaining. Half a carto and a bottle of 151 later I finally found some of this G grade acting remotely funny. It's an insult upon this entire planet that the director thought anyone could find anything beneficial from this more, he should go and buy a rope. And to the actors in this flick, I hope you got paid well to be in this joke because I doubt you will ever work again. In summary I fine everyone in this movie 100 grand and 12 demerit points off your acting licence.

Problem with these type of movies is that literally dozens of them are being made each year. Luckily for use only a handful are given a theatrical release, while the others are being pushed straight to video or TV, such as this movie.The foremost problem of this movie is really its originality. It's one of those movies which uses the "Die Hard" formula of a tough but troubled guy being at the wrong place at the wrong time. In this case it's a character played by Casper Van Dien, who works for a security agency that thoroughly test safety procedures for companies and individuals. In this case he's being send to a cruise ship, which of course gets hijacked. You can see this movie as a sort of mix of "Die Hard" and "Air Force One" and the movie doesn't even try to conceal that those two movies were probably its biggest source of 'inspiration'. So really, you can't regard this movie as an original one at all. It uses all of the clichés out of the book and this movie really doesn't offer any surprises or anything that remotely resembles anything original.Like you can expect from a movie such as this, it has a very weak script. Or rather said, it features some very lazy writing. Like I said before, the movie features nothing original but also the actual story itself features some elements which are far from likely and are just plain ridicules truthfully. I mean, hijacking an huge cruise ship with only about 8 guys, of which halve only carry some small guns and then ask for a ransom of 'only' 10 million dollars, for a ship that is about worth 10 times that amount is itself already quite ridicules. How do they even intend to split that money afterward? Every person gets just over a million or something? That's hardly profitable for such a big and risky undertaking. And then there is the case of taking the passengers hostage. Somehow they manage to take all passengers on the huge ship hostage and they manage to put them inside one room, with only one guy with his pistol, which he can't even seem to be able to hold right, watching them. You never see more than like 30 hostages however, as if they were all the people who were aboard at the time. Also when the Van Dien character goes looking for his son and vice versa, no matter which room they walk in through on the huge cruise ship, they always bump into each other instantly. Just some examples of the lazy writing within the movie.But it of course is an action flick, so the story of course becomes secondary. But then again, it's not as if this movie features any good action at all. Halve of the actors look as if they had never hold a weapon before and the movie is filled with some ridicules slow-motion. It really becomes laughable at points.Of course the movie also doesn't feature the best actors, though I must say that Casper Van Dien really isn't a bad 'action hero' and actor, as far as the genre and B-movie circuit is concerned. He just however also suffers from the same problem as Tom Cruise; no matter how old he is, he just never looks convincing enough to play the father of a teenager. Van Dien once started out as a promising new young actor but starring in movies like this really doesn't help his career much. He's probably capable of something better, though he is never really given the right opportunity to show it. All of the other actors also do a fair enough job but their characters are just so formulaic that they never truly become interesting.Oh well, it's not the worst genre movie I have ever seen but it also ain't exactly the most original or memorable one either.4/10http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

What a poor excuse for New Zealnd Movie making. I'm ashamed to call myself a New Zealander when this movie exists and is currently playing on New Zealand satellite TV (Aug 2006). The cast is made up of a large number of local soap stars. The ship, in real life, is one of the inter-island ferries that travel daily between the two main islands and even has the company's logo (a dolphin) still all over the set including on the ship's funnel. The ship is supposed to be a cruise ship/ferry between the USA and Mexico. It has obvious signs of rust and old age all over the place yet is supposed to be a luxury ship on it's maiden voyage. One of the scenes shows the snow capped peaks of New Zealand's South island in the background for God's sake! Must have been a very cold time on the USA/Mexico area! The story is weak, the acting is weaker and the new Zealand/American accents just don't work. I expect the New Zealand tax payer contributed to the production cost of this movie and that was a waste of money better spent on a real production. I know high school kids in New Zealand who could make better movies with their cell phones. Goof: There is a truck in the hold with tagging on it and they stuck a Taco Company sign on the door of the truck, presumably to make it look like it was American. But some of the sign is over the top of the tagging - you'd think they would have noticed that in the props department before attaching it. I'd love to go on but it just isn't worth the trouble in any way.