GoRichard7 I avoided this for 10 years... I enjoyed the game too much and didn't want to be disappointed. Here it is 10 years later and guess what ? I was freaking disappointed. Here are my thoughts on it, FYI there are no spoilers - "nothing" in this movie is worth spoiling.1. Number one warning : it is categorized as an "Action, Crime, Drama" and rated PG-13. - only the rating is appropriate. 2. If the goal is not to be like the game then you shouldn't use the title, character and style of the game - BTW this goal was totally achieved. 3. Without the title name, there is no reason to see this film - there was nothing memorable about this movie. 4. I will be remembering writer Beau Thorne and directed John Moore - if I ever see anything with their names on it, I'm running away screaming. 5. I saw this for free and I demanded my money back - I got $20 to go away and stop yelling.

ghenry-68928 Max Payne is inspired from a game with a same name, which tells us about the journey of a rogue police officer who are looking for a revenge over the death of his family. Directed by John Moore and starring Mark Wahlberg and Mila Kunis.The story begins with Max (played by Mark Wahlberg), a maverick cop, looking for revenge for the death of his family and partner. Later, he teamed up with beautiful and deadly Russian mobster, Mona Sax (played by Mila Kunis) to start his journey into the underworld to hunt Jack Lupino (played by Amaury Nolasco) down.First of all, for somebody who plays the game and quite fond of it, Max Payne fails miserably in capturing every parts that make the game interesting. The concept of a single man against the corruption of the system is never shown in the film. Rather than a journey of a simple hard-boiled detective, it simply devolved into mindless action flicks. They even misinterpreted the nightmares that Max had becoming some stupid supernatural elements with winged demons.The performance are sub-par, but you actually understand with it as probably the cast themselves has no idea what they should do during the take. We couldn't blame them at all. The actions are completely dull, and simply just try to emulate the bullet time effect with no success.It also looks as if a neo-noir film, with all edgy gritty more dark tone, but after you watch the half of the movie, you realized the story has no noir elements in it. They simply put the darken all the shots and call it a noir film.So overall, this movie is a disgrace and insult for everyone who take a look at this movie because they loved the game at the first place. But probably for somebody who never heard about Max Payne before, the movie could be your stupid action flick to watch.

Konstantin Belyakov For a screen adaptation this is too loose in terms of script. For a fresh new story about cop taking his revenge against drugs and conspiracy this is also too loose in terms of script. I won't join my voice with the chorus saying "this is not how it had been in the game". The lowest-rate reviews are of that kind. Yet, writers had to choose side. Which they did not. In terms of brand new movie this is simple: plot seems too much generic. Just another cop who takes revenge for his family against conspiracy and corruption. How many of that kind do we know? A lot.In terms of screen adaptation there's too little of Max Payne in this Max Payne movie. Yes, we've got picturesque scenes and precisely directed vignettes (more of the visual kind). But... you know, that is all. Not a movie of Max Payne, but a movie with a cameo of Max Payne. Some different story that takes place somewhere in those parts, and remarkable details glimpse to you now and then. Yet, a totally different story. Not only in script (god knows, that is not necessary) but in the terms of feeling. Bright sun, neat offices, cute family-driven premises are not the things that should surround us! Still... I can't say this is a bad movie. Everything but script seems supreme. To me, at least. I really like visuals. I think Mark Wahlberg is a fairly good Max Payne (except that brand stupid smile is lost). And I love how accurate and beautifully they depict weapons. and...Overall, if you can stand a stupid script, I think you will like this.

Adam Foidart Just when you thought video game movies couldn't get even worse, here comes the pain! "Max Payne" that is. It's a dull, clichéd detective story that masquerades as a supernatural film in order to sucker you in. The story follows Max Payne, a detective who had a loving wife and family, but lost it all one night when intruders came into his house and murdered them while he was away at work. Ten minutes earlier and he could have saved them so of course, he has become a shadow of his former self, only dealing with cold cases and generally walking around brooding. When a girl who unsuccessfully tries to seduce him turns up dead, he is suspected of being the killer and is forced to go on the run. The killer, or killers appear to be connected to a narcotic drug "Valkyr", who in turn appears to be connected to his wife. Was it all a senseless murder after all, or a big conspiracy? It's up to this super sleuth to figure it out, along with the sister of the dead girl, Mona (Mila Kunis).This really feels like a dusty old detective story script that was re-purposed to be a video game movie. The plot, concerning Mark Walhberg, walking around the crime-ridden streets brooding constantly is a tremendous bore. Suspect number 1 for this crime is the director, who makes none of the characters remotely interesting. Max Payne is about as emotionally responsive as a T-800, except constantly depressed. During the whole film he doesn't crack a single smile and always appears on the verge of tears. He's not even interested in Olga Kurylenko (who was in another bad video game movie I saw, "Hitman"). She strips down, completely naked and tries to seduce him. He looks at her like she's a blank wall. He doesn't even get excited when he's gunning down the bad guys or running away from danger. Even getting shot in the arm barely gets a rouse out of Max so you cannot connect with this character, no matter how tragic his back story is. Mila Kunis doesn't fare much better. Her character is basically just angry at the fact that her sister was murdered. That's it. She tags along with Max Payne, sometimes. Mostly she just disappears from the movie. Our villains are completely bland as well. Amaury Nolasco plays a 'roided up assassin that is really just a generic serial killer. Believe me, even that sentence makes it sound more interesting than it actually is. Even the overall mystery of who killed Max Payne's wife and child is really easy to figure out from the get-go (due to the overuse of logos on the victims and items related to the case) and once you do figure it out, you're checking your watch hoping the running time is almost over. No such luck."But wait a minute!" you might be saying "I saw the trailer for this movie and it looked really cool! There were these creepy angels flying around, rooftops exploding into scenes taken straight out of hell, and I even saw a clip where the people investigating a murder said that the wounds couldn't have been caused by anything human!" To you, I'm sorry to say that you have been terribly misled. You see; someone at the head of the studio watched this movie and realized how boring it all was. They knew that none of the characters would entice you in the least to check it out, so they threw in a bunch of clips of the characters on drugs having hallucinations. To clarify, whenever people use the Valkyr drug, they start having these visions of angels and of hell. At first, you don't know this but it becomes obvious that every scene where you hear fluttering wings or shadows over a character that is screaming or running away in panic is just a bunch of hallucinations. The film teases with the idea that the drug actually causes people to see invisible creatures and that the murders are being causes by these angelic beings, but it is not the case. The wounds that "couldn't have been caused by a human" are, in fact caused by a human and there are no hidden mystical creatures in this movie.At least with some bad video game movies, like "Resident Evil", "Super Mario Brothers" or even "Bloodrayne" the movie sucks, but there are some interesting action scenes and maybe a couple of cool creatures or interesting monsters to make the time pass by. It really isn't the case here. Yeah there are some shootouts, but the climactic battles are about as interesting as your average bed pillow and I struggle to call a bunch of hallucinations "cool creatures". They could have been edited out of the movie completely and not affected the plot in the least.Everything about this movie screams "bad direction", particularly considering the stars, which have proved themselves to be competent actors before. You can do so much better than "Max Payne", which by the way, sets itself up for a sequel at the end of the credits (a sequel that thankfully will never come to pass). Just don't watch it. It sucks, it's even worse than you've heard. (On DVD, April 25, 2014)