Ice Cube makes an appealing lead and no-one ever mentions that he might be a little on the tubby side to really cut it as an action hero.
XXX: State of the Union (2005)
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:135
Fresh:22
Rotten:113
Average Rating:3.8/10
Consensus: Even more absurd and implausible than the first XXX movie.
Runtime: 1 hr 41 mins
Genre: Action/Adventure
Synopsis: Ice Cube replaces Vin Diesel for this hard-bangin' sequel which favors fists, cars, and snooping over the original's heavy dose of extreme sports stunts. NSA agent Gibbons (Samuel Jackson, back... Ice Cube replaces Vin Diesel for this hard-bangin' sequel which favors fists, cars, and snooping over the original's heavy dose of extreme sports stunts. NSA agent Gibbons (Samuel Jackson, back from the original) finds his group under attack by well-armed, well-informed combatants, forcing him to activate a new XXX, Darius Stone (Cube), an old Navy Seal buddy currently cooling his heels in an army prison. It turns out there's a plan to whack the president (Peter Strauss) and a deranged secretary of defense played by Willem Dafoe is behind it. What's more important is the cool way Darius knows how to land a speeding boat on a bridge, then walk away in slow motion as it blows up behind him. Other great scenes include a tank battle on an aircraft carrier and a race with a bullet train that makes THE FRENCH CONNECTION look like a turtle race. There's some hilarious dialogue, such as when Darius recruits his old D.C. car-jacking buddies to ride into battle against the corrupt militia, leading to the "first tank-jacking in history." Scott Speedman plays a sympathetic Fed; Lola Jackson and Sunny Mabrey are the sexy chicks. There's lots of greal looking cars, cool gadgets, and pumpin' rap-crunk music. Director Lee Tamahori also helmed James Bond's DIE ANOTHER DAY and the 1997 thriller THE EDGE. [More]
Starring: Ice Cube, Samuel L. Jackson, Scott Speedman, Peter Strauss
Starring: Ice Cube, Samuel L. Jackson, Scott Speedman, Peter Strauss, Sunny Mabrey, Willem Dafoe, Lola Jackson, Xzibit
Director: Lee Tamahori
Director: Lee Tamahori
Screenwriter: Simon Kinberg
Producer: Neal H. Moritz, Arne Schmidt
Composer: Marco Beltrami
Studio: Columbia Pictures
Reviews for XXX: State of the Union
OK you don't expect a sequel to 2002's brainless XXX to be an action masterwork, but this is so preposterous that it feels like an overblown spoof of the original.
James Bond’s producers aren’t going to like Die Another Day director Lee Tamahori delivering a sleeker, more contemporary thriller than he made for them.
Any movie that has the President quoting Tupac had an idea somewhere along the way.
One of the best sequels ever made without the star of the original... The only reason to criticize is if you just don’t like big, unrealistic action.
Intellectually as dumb as a door post, but Ice Cube provides enough fun.
Opens explosively and never lets up, with Lee Tamahori (Die Another Day) in full command of the action and Simon Kinberg an equally astute writer with a flair for linking socko action set pieces with terse characterization.
Ice Cube keeps the action-movie franchise alive with a pleasing one-two punch of humor and burly physicality.
With Ice Cube at the wheel, it delivers all the adrenaline a junkie could ever want. Just don't pay too much attention to anything else going on in the movie.
Is it too late to toss Ice Cube's name into the hat in the new James Bond sweepstakes? I'd be down with that.
Ice Cube brings his trademark charisma and street sensibility to a film that wouldn't be nearly as entertaining without it, though he gets considerable help from better-than-the-material-deserves performances by Jackson and Dafoe.
Delivers the no-thinking-required, over-the-top goods, with some surprising digs at the original film providing the icing on this tasty bit of cinematic junk food.
It has just enough sociology, and is wholly dismissive of physics and logic. Still, the last half-hour's unbridled action raises it to the original's enjoyable-trash level.
This is that rare B movie that’s rooted in gut-level stirrings of power and retaliation.
The movie appears to have employed a Super Nintendo as its screenwriter, and it boasts all the elegance and character development of a Transformers episode.
Latest News for XXX: State of the Union
July 21, 2008:
XXX3 to Revive Vin Diesel
The producers of the XXX franchise made every effort to remove Vin Diesel from the series. Now, director Rob Cohen and Diesel have sat down with Revolution Studios' Joe Roth to... More...
January 10, 2008:
Box Office Guru Preview: Captain Jack and Captain Morgan Set Sail
For the first time in three weeks, studios will pack a Friday with plenty of new releases as four films open or expand nationwide giving the box office chart a major shakeup.... More...
April 05, 2007:
Box Office Guru Preview: "Grindhouse" Prepares for Easter Carnage
Easter weekend sees four new wide releases hopping into the marketplace aiming to give the spring box office a boost. More...
August 17, 2006:
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This week at the movies, we've got snakes.... on a plane ("Snakes on a Plane," starring Samuel L. Jackson), slackers on a campus ("Accepted," starring Justin... More...
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