Knowing, slickly produced, director Michael Vaughn has clearly been studying Fight Club closely since his much less interesting Layer Cake (circa 2005). The climax would not be out of place in any of Arnie's classics, but the unflinching brutality is. Nick Cage is minor in his supporting role, and quite OK at it, but the real stars are so obviously the kids, whose patois would be familiar (but surprising) to any geek of the 1990s. Somehow this reminded me of Brick, a revival of an old genre via youth.
This is certainly the action movie of the year, worthy of its 8.2 rating on IMDB and position at #167 on the top-250. There will be sequels... if you can't innovate, renovate, I guess.