Synopsis: Following the death of his uncle in mysterious circumstances, teenager Alex Rider discovers that all is not what it seems in his family. Rather than being a bank manager, his uncle was in fact a spy, and it turns out he has been grooming Alex for a career in espionage. Recruited by Mr Blunt and Mrs Jones from the Special Operations Division of MI6, Alex is supplied with an array of high tech gadgets and sent on his first dangerous mission – to stop the dangerous billionaire Darrius Sayle.
Conclusion: Well, what a cool movie. The introduction should be stripped out and used by the UK tourist board, I wanted to go and visit London almost immediatley!
Ewan McGregor stars as the ace spy Ian Rider, having all the skill and gadgets of a true MI6 employee (at least in films). The start looks promising with this primo star leading the pack, and then he gets killed 5 mins into the film! – wonder how much he made for that!
The Story continues with his 14 yr old nephew (who seems a little big for 14yrs dwarfing his room mates), young Rider is introduced to Alan Blunt played by Bill Nighy – an interesting if not monotone character, which reminded me of the father figure in Joe 90, ever the glasses are the same!
Anyhow there are lots of similarities between this movie and the Bond series, Stephen Fry plays the "Q" Mr. Smithers – where do kids get all their gadgets from? Hamley’s of course!
The movie parallels again with Darrius Sayle’s henchman, a large oriental guy with a hat – well I won’t spoil it for you. All the similarities and parallels are very much "tongue in cheek", but there are some unique twists and turns that makes this movie great. I look forward to more in the series of this "Harry Potter-isk" (which is mentioned) spy movie – good for kids (big and small) – Go see it!