Phillip Noyce certainly has a terrific track record with action films (Clear and Present Danger is one of the best thrillers of the 1990s) and Jolie is at her most bankable when she's an action heroine. Still, this feels like a cross between The Bourne Identity and Minority Report (which is likely why Tom Cruise dropped out). I'm hoping that the film will go the more daring route of having Jolie actually be a treacherous Russian spy. But I'm guessing that the film plays out generically, with only Chiwetel Eijofor kinda-sorta believing her until the second-act climax, where he discovers that Liv Schreiber is the baddie. Schreiber revealing himself by murdering Eijofor in a 'shocking twist' is optional. Nothing specifically against this film, but I'd love to see one of these 'I'm not really the secret bad guy' movies have the framed party say "I'm innocent, and I'm going to prove it by sitting at my desk until the alleged foul deed is supposed to go down". Having said all of that, the film looks like old-school fun and I'd see Eijofor and Schreiber in almost anything.
Scott Mendelson
Scott Mendelson
2 comments:
Looks kind of like a grab bag of genre cliches to me. I have trouble caring about these political/action thrillers with all their little plot revelations. I did like Clear and Present Danger a lot, but that movie works for me because it has a plausible viewpoint of american imperialism. Ryan's discovery that it was an american laser-guided bomb, not a car bomb, that blew up the cartel meeting is chilling in its pertinence, which is greater than ever. And it's action was largely believable, outside the obligatory but unnecessary climactic gun battle. At it's best C+P resembles a Costa-Gravas political thriller.
This just looks way too commercial and marketing based. I know Jolie loves to run around with guns and all, but I feel she is capable of so much more, and either she doesn't understand that or no one can come up with anything worthy of her, so she keeps doing these basically cheesy big-budget action films.
Looks kind of like a grab bag of genre cliches to me. I have trouble caring about these political/action thrillers with all their little plot revelations. I did like Clear and Present Danger a lot, but that movie works for me because it has a plausible viewpoint of american imperialism. Ryan's discovery that it was an american laser-guided bomb, not a car bomb, that blew up the cartel meeting is chilling in its pertinence, which is greater than ever. And it's action was largely believable, outside the obligatory but unnecessary climactic gun battle. At it's best C+P resembles a Costa-Gravas political thriller.
This just looks way too commercial and marketing based. I know Jolie loves to run around with guns and all, but I feel she is capable of so much more, and either she doesn't understand that or no one can come up with anything worthy of her, so she keeps doing these basically cheesy big-budget action films.
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