In any crisis situation — particularly ones that involve shootings or other lethal attacks — it’s a safe bet that witnesses to the event would each have a slightly different take on things as they recalled the frightening moment. In Vantage Point, we’re taken on an edgy, action-packed reprising of an attempted assassination of a U.S. president that not only gives us glimpses into an innocent bystander’s recollections, but also reveals the viewpoints of several of the participants — on both sides of the attack.



The ultimate goal, of course, is to reveal in the final, climactic moments of the film the truth of what occurred and the motivations of those attempting to kill the most powerful political leader on the planet.



The set-up is fairly simple. William Hurt plays the fictional President Ashton, who has spearheaded a worldwide campaign to finally bring an end to the mindless terrorism that has gripped the international community since 9/11. Due to Ashton’s efforts, the world’s leaders — including the heads of all the Arab states — are brought together in Salamanca, Spain, for a historic summit to draw up a treaty that will guarantee the end of terrorist attacks.



Among his Secret Service detail is Thomas Barnes (Dennis Quaid), an agent who “took a bullet” for Ashton a few years earlier in a previous assassination attempt. The summit in Spain is the first time Barnes is back on the job, having apparently suffered some form of emotional or psychological breakdown in the aftermath of his heroic act of presidential lifesaving. While several fellow agents are concerned whether he’s ready, it’s made clear Barnes’ return was expedited, thanks to his longtime friend and fellow agent, Kent Taylor (Matthew Fox).



Initially, we witness the shooting of the president — and subsequent bombing of the Salamanca city hall — through the eyes of a television producer (Sigourney Weaver) and her team, sitting in a satellite truck nearby. It’s a good place to start, as it provides the view closest to what the average TV viewer would have seen sitting at home.



Then, an onscreen digital clock — and all those initial set-up scenes, plus the actual attack — quickly rewind, taking us back to noon, approximately 20 minutes before the key moment. We then see seven other views of what happened, including the perspectives of the president, Agent Barnes and various participants who orchestrated the attack.



While the continuous quick rewind — always back to that 12:00:00 on the clock — gets a bit formulaic and monotonous, it does keep the various storylines somewhat in proper perspective. In order not to spoil things, I won’t reveal important details. But it’s the scriptwriting — the all-important framework for the storytelling — that causes a number of problems for Vantage Point. I often found myself having to suspend logic to buy into this movie. Many things just don’t make much sense.



First, the conversations, in the middle of a live broadcast, between Weaver’s TV producer and her field reporter (who subtly inserts her political views into the report) don’t ring true. Furthermore, Forest Whitaker’s character — American tourist Howard Lewis, who’s visiting Spain and in the plaza at the time of the attack — engages in an equally unbelievable conversation with a man he happens to encounter.



Even worse, the camcorder-toting Whitaker just happens to capture footage that later proves instrumental in revealing key plot points. In real life, an innocent tourist would never turn away from the action to capture a window with a fluttering curtain that may or may not be hiding a gunman.



Perhaps the biggest gaffe is how the president’s arrival at the city hall plaza is presented. Despite a crowd numbering in the many hundreds, angrily protesting the president and U.S. policies — and even though he was clearly well-protected by the Secret Service detail — Ashton is walked within a few feet of a hostile crowd. That’s something that would never happen to a real U.S. commander in chief.



But even the plot implausibilities don’t wreck Vantage Point. The main thing here is the action, especially a truly amazing car chase involving Quaid’s character in pursuit of terrorists that ranks among the best of such sequences in recent memory, including the Bourne film franchise.

Vantage Point

★★1/2



Stars: Dennis Quaid, Matthew Fox and Forest Whitaker

Director: Pete Travis

Rating: PG-13 for sequences of intense violence and action, some disturbing images and brief strong language