PROOF OF LIFE (2000) - More Maximus, Less Meg.

I remember walking around the TV section at a local Best Buy or some other huge electronics store back a few years back and seeing some scenes from this movie, which I'd never heard about before. There was Russell Crowe, all decked out in camo face paint, packing an assault rifle and reducing population of Latin America by the dozens in a frantic, violent rescue scene. With huge surround sound and a big screen, it worked pretty well as a demo, but years passed and I forgot my mental note to check out "that action movie with Gladiator." After seeing it in its entirety for the first time now, maybe I shouldn't have bothered after all.

Every terrorist's worst nightmare - Maximus with a gun.

Terry Thorne (Crowe) is a retrieval expert. He works as a hostage negotiator for a big insurance firm, handling all the money transfers to dangerous criminal groups and getting back his clients in one piece. As we see from the movie's terrific opening sequence, Terry isn't some paper-pushing desk jockey -  he's the real deal. He's sent to Chechnya to recover a kidnap victim, and thanks to his crafty ex-soldier ways, he double crosses Russians and Chechnyans, giving them empty bags of cash and setting them to fight each other as he makes his escape with the hostage.

You can't be a movie hostage without growing a sweet beard.

A brief switch of scenery and we're introduced to Alice (Meg Ryan) and Peter Bowman (David Morse), Americans living and working in South America. Peter is an engineer working for an oil firm, and his dam project has just been canceled, leading to some tension in the marriage as Alice wonders whether its time to return to the States. They don't argue for long though, as Peter gets kidnapped by guerillas the next day, and is taken far up into the mountains, and held for ransom.. Alice eventually gets in contact with Terry through the oil company, and together they begin to plan a way to get Peter back to safety. While her husband rots in the jungle and is tortured daily, Alice develops a thing for Terry (must be the accent, mate), which is apparently O.K., since we get some nice romantic music in the background to set the mood. Whatever.

Who the hell let Meg Ryan near an action movie?

Russell Crowe is, as always, watchable in anything. He's convincing as the ex-soldier and overall badass with a heart of gold Terry, and he carries the film with his performance. Meg Ryan on the other hand, does everything humanly possible to be the most insufferable character in the movie. Every scene she's in drags the movie down to soap opera levels of cheese, and it's tough to sympathize with her since she seems more worried about banging Russell Crowe than getting her poor bastard of a husband back safely. The romance feels forced, is uninteresting, and just slows down the movie when the movie really needs a jolt of tension. The few action scenes in the movie are well shot, especially the finale, which has one of the best commando raids on film and is the highlight of the movie.

Damn gringos! Always causing trouble.

It's really a shame that the movie focuses so much on the sappy romance between the leads when all it needed was a shot in the arm to get the juices flowing. This one had plenty of potential, which just goes to waste. With an interesting premise and a great star at the helm, it should have been much better than this. It had everything going for it and loses a lot of momentum in the middle of the film and the awesome action sequence at the end isn't enough to save the movie from being an average thriller lacking in the thrills department.

Best scene: The hostage rescue finale, with Terry and his crew wreaking havoc on the guerrilla camp in a realistic, vicious firefight as all hell breaks loose.

Best quote: Anytime Russell Crow abuses the word "mate" in his Aussie accent.

  TL;DR - Too much Meg Ryan and not enough action makes for a boring "thriller" - 5/10

HANNA (2011) - Killer girl, killer soundtrack.

Hanna (Saoirse Ronan) is a teenager living in a remote cabin in the secluded Finnish forest with her father Erik Heller (Eric Bana). She spends most of her days doing ordinary kid things like training to become an assassin by hunting deer with bows and arrows, gutting said deer with her bare hands, engaging in hand to hand combat with her father, target practice with pistols, memorizing fake life stories, and learning about a dozen languages. Hanna has spent nearly her entire life living there, away from the real world and any sort of technology. The only real piece of technology she comes into contact is a radio transmitter which her father presents to her, explaining that once it is turned on, a CIA agent by the name of Marissa Weigler (Cate Blanchett) will learn of their location and come to find and kill her. He warns her to only flick it on when she feels ready to face the challenge.

Forget Barbies... Hanna enjoys gutting deer with her bare hands.

Hanna finally decides she is ready, and flicks on the transmitter. Erik reluctantly agrees, suits up and leaves for Germany, knowing that Weigler will soon send a commando team to seize them. Hanna is captured later that night, and interrogated at a special facility in Morocco, where Hanna kills one of Weigler's body doubles and escapes. We learn that Erik Heller is a rogue CIA agent, and that that Erik has been training his daughter for all these years to murder Weigler. She hires a team of assassins to track her down and kill Hanna, who is now hitching a ride across Europe with the family of a girl she befriended. As the assassins bear down on her, Hanna will discover some unsettling truths about her family, her father and Weigler, as she finds out more about who she really is.

Cate Blanchett as a murderous CIA agent is some inspired casting.

One of Hanna's main strengths is the quality of the main cast. Saoirse Ronan is just fantastic as the deadly yet naive girl who is slowly discovering the world she's been sheltered from for all those years. Imagine Natalie Portman's Mathilda in The Professional, but with an unhinged, savage edge. Hanna wasn't taught to be an assassin, she was born one. It's not an easy sell to make her character convincing, but she does a great job of it, and outshines every one else in the movie, even Cate Blanchett who I thought was surprisingly good in her unusual villainous role. The much advertised score by The Chemical Brothers is just fantastic as well, making scenes like Hanna's prison escape (an awesome scene, by the way) explode with urgency and tension.

The chase at the docks is one of the best in the movie.

Hanna is at its best when sticking to pure, unadulterated action. For all of its faults in other areas, Hanna shines with its crisp fight choreography, which shows an obvious attention to detail in several of the action scenes. By far my favorite scene in the movie is one in which Eric Bana's character is followed by several CIA operatives into an empty underground lot, where he is cornered. He instinctively and quite brutally disarms all of his opponents with lightning quick hits and coolly dispatches them before walking away. The entire scene is shot in one continuous take that runs for several minutes, and with the intense score pumping away, it's easily the most thrilling set piece in the film. Another stand out is a nighttime chase and fight scene in some Spanish docks, as Hanna leaps from one container to another while she pummels and stabs baddies left and right with cruel efficiency.

By the end of the movie, Hanna racks up an impressive body count.

It's disappointing then, that Joe Wright distracts himself so much with trying to make a visually distinctive movie that he forgets that the core ingredient of an action movie is action and story. Hanna has too little of both. We get only tidbits of background story about the characters. By knowing so little about them, it's hard to relate and care for anyone. What precious little action there is is at times ruined by the use of that damned shaky camera work that directors are so fond of these days. If you've got a gorgeously photographed and well-executed fight scene, why spoil the fun by making it nearly impossible to see what's going on? Not every movie has to be Cloverfield or Battle: Los Angeles. Wright has a talent for making beautiful films, and Hanna has some amazing views, but the dizzying camera movement during action scenes is distracting and detracts from the experience. At least it's got a bitching soundtrack.

TL;DR - Nicely shot, fast paced and with a killer score, but lacking in the action department - 7/10

BRICK (2005) - A high school crime story

Director Rian Johnson's debut Brick was released to good acclaim in 2005 when it picked up a few prizes, good reviews and then dropped off the radar for many movie fans. I fortunately came across it while on a film noir kick after re-watching one of my favorites, L.A. Confidential. Starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt before he hit the jackpot with Inception, with a sharp script and a rich atmosphere drawing on inspiration from film noir mystery movies of the past, Brick was a very welcome surprise.

Brendan just doesn't know when to give up.

High school senior Brendan (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) receives a mysterious phone call from his estranged ex-girlfriend Emily (Emilie de Ravin) pleading for help. The desperate, confusing call ends abruptly when Brendan is buzzed by a threatening, speeding muscle car. Brendan begins asking around for Emily at school and no one seems willing to help him. He slowly but surely begins to piece together tidbits of information gleamed from classmates and local dope fiends. With help from his friend and eccentric loner Brain (Matt O'Leary), Brendan investigates a drug ring which may have something to do with Emily's disappearance.

Drugs are bad for you.

A breakthrough leads a disheartened Brendan to Emily's dead body near a water tunnel. As he continues to dig deeper into her murder, he comes into contact with Pin, the local drug kingpin who runs a heroin operation in the city, and his various thugs. Brendan also stumbles into an uneasy relationship with the popular Laura, whose motivations are less than clear. Without giving any more of the plot away to avoid spoiling anything, Brendan will soon realize that he has put himself into a dangerous situation that is quickly threatening to overwhelm him. Drugs, violence, betrayal and deceit all intertwine to hinder Brendan's investigation.

Ally or femme fatale? In Brick, nothing is what it appears.

 This flick is proof that you don't need big names and a big budget to make a damn good movie. The strength of the movie is in the story, which unravels at a leisurely pace while keeping you interested and building tension throughout. Rian Johnson gets the best out of his limited cast, especially with Joseph Gordon-Levitt who nails it as the stubborn, fast talking and resourceful Brendan. Brendan is a memorable character, as is Pin, whose scenes give the movie some welcome comic relief at times (the scenes in his kitchen and basement are hilarious) and yet still manages to seem convincing as a cold, calculating drug lord.

Running a drug empire from Mama's kitchen - like a boss.

The score is subdued but effective, and the lighting and atmosphere is jut gorgeous and gives the movie a gritty vibe that makes it all the more enjoyable. If you're in the mood for a good detective story and can look past some of its quirks, especially some of the obscure slang, Brick hits the spot. It can drag a bit at times and if the deliberate pacing annoys you, it might not be your cup of tea, but it is otherwise an enthralling, exciting crime yarn with some memorable scenes.

TL;DR - Slick crime story meets film noir meets suburbia - 7.5/10

POINT BLANK (1967) - A masterful Lee Marvin revenge flick

What's there to be said about Lee Marvin that hasn't been said before? The man was a true screen legend, and starred in some of the best action movies to be put to celluloid. He made a career out of playing steely, tough guys in movies like The Dirty Dozen, The Killers, Hell in the Pacific and classic Westerns like The Professionals. 6 foot 2 inches tall, a deep voice that rivaled Darth Vader on his best strep throat days, a fondness for huge Smith & Wesson revolvers and with a body count that makes natural disasters jealous, it was no wonder that he was cast as Walker in this 1967 neo-noir crime thriller. Point Blank is somewhat of a cult classic that has gotten better with time and has been copied by countless other action movies since its release.

"Knock, knock. Who's there?" IT'S LEE MARVIN!

Criminally-inclined Walker (Lee Marvin), his wife Lynne (Sharon Acker) and one of his lifelong  friends Mal Reese (John Vernon) plan and execute a heist in San Francisco, stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars during a money exchange at Alcatraz prison. As they are making good their escape, Reese betrays Walker, shooting him several times, taking Lynne with him and leaving the wounded Walker to die in the abandoned prison. Much to our viewing pleasure, Walker is a tough son of a bitch, since he survives and makes his way off the island. After some hallucinations, and flashbacks of his happier times with Lynne and Reese, Walker immediately begins planning his revenge. Walker will stop at nothing to find Lynne and Reese, kill Reese and get back his share of the loot: $93,000.

1960s vintage Angie Dickinson - yum.

Walker meets up with a guy named Yost, who has information about the people he's after. Apparently, Reese had betrayed Walker in order to pay off a huge debt he owed to a gang of high-class criminals that goes by the name "The Organization." Intent on finding that backstabbing bastard, Walker heads to Los Angeles, where he breaks into Lynne's new house, but Reese is nowhere to be found. Depressed and knowing that Walker will never forgive her, Lynne kills herself with an overdose of prescription pills. Their betrayal has made Walker indifferent to anyone's suffering but his own. He leaves Lynne lying on the ground and goes off to find Lynne's sister Chris (Angie Dickinson), who is supposedly Reese's new girl. Chris turns out to be more helpful than Walker thought. She agrees to help him and together they set out to find Reese. Revenge is the only thing in Walker's mind, and may God have mercy on whoever gets in his way.

Reese betrayed Walker, shot him, took his money and his girl. Yeah, you're f*cked pal.

Lee Marvin played badasses and tough guy roles throughout his career, but he was born to play Walker. Quiet, strong, violent and determined, Walker is a force of nature as he rampages through Los Angeles on his quest to get back his money. Angie Dickinson does a good job with her character as a contrast to Walker's emotionless granite demeanor. The script is tight and simple, and John Boorman's direction is amazing. The movie incorporates techniques and motifs that were relatively unknown at the time and uses them to tell Walker's story in a visually dazzling manner. Point Blank ends up becoming a no-frills revenge thriller with a career-defining role for Marvin, while at the same time breaking new ground in the action genre. My gripes? I didn't find John Vernon's acting all that good, which didn't detract from any joy at seeing Walker beat the living crap out of him though. The musical score is also a bit of an acquired taste at times, so be warned.

Walker just wants his $93,000. You better hope you don't get in his way.

It's not hard to see why Point Blank is regarded as an underrated classic. Lee Marvin in the role of his life, a simple yet convincing story, a gorgeous 1960s California setting, and a heavy dose of noir action and grit. This movie would later be remade in the 90s as Payback, starring Mel Gibson, but it was far from being as good as this one. Point Blank is a classic, with a forceful Lee Marvin and beautiful Angie Dickinson at the top of their game, and not to be missed.

TL;DR - Hard-boiled revenge thriller and a colossal Lee Marvin - 9/10

UNKNOWN (2011) - Liam Neeson has a slight memory problem...

Unless you've been living in North Korea for the last couple of decades, being force fed daily rations of propaganda films and polishing your Kim Jong Il pins, chances are you know who Liam Neeson is. You probably also know that the guy can play a pretty convincing badass. He shot, stabbed and throat punched half of Europe in Taken, beat the shit out of Batman himself in Batman Begins, cut dudes in half with a lightsaber in Star Wars prequels, and even his voice as Aslan, the lion in the Narnia movies, managed to make Mufasa burn with jealousy at the sound of a superior Irish voice. As if that wasn't enough, apparently he has a talent for bashing people's faces in in real life, seeing as how he was a champion boxer as a teenager. That being said, it doesn't take much to get me to watch a movie with Neeson in it, so I was waiting to get my hands on Unknown since I caught a glimpse of the snazzy trailer.

Liam's got ladies for every month of the year. This month, it's January.

Dr. Martin Harris (Neeson) and his wife Liz (January Jones) have just arrived in Berlin. He is scheduled to speak at a biotechnology conference in the city, but their trip suddenly takes a turn for the unexpected as Martin remembers he misplaced his briefcase at the airport. He takes a cab driven by a pretty blonde back to the airport, which ends disastrously after the car plunges into a river after a freak accident. The girl saves the unconscious Martin and drags him to shore, where rescuers try to help him, and she leaves the scene of the accident. Martin wakes up in the next scene, completely confused as to his situation. A doctor informs him that he's been in a coma for the past four days, and that he had no I.D. on him, so they couldn't find any family to contact. Martin is eventually released from the hospital and goes out to look for Liz, remembering his reservation at the hotel and making his way there.

Visit Berlin! Experience the coma of a lifetime after a horrible car crash!

At the hotel, Martin gets the shock of a lifetime when his wife refuses to recognize him, and introduces him to her husband, another man by the name of Martin Harris (Aidan Quinn). Martin is escorted out of the hotel, and he's forced to try and piece together the fragments of his memory in order to figure out just what the hell is going on. He eventually gets ahold of Gina (Diane Kruger), the cabbie who saved his life. She reluctantly agrees to help him, while Martin also seeks help from an ex-East German secret police officer named Jurgen (Bruno Ganz). Jurgen finds a series of numbers written in Martin's notebook, which he figures must be some sort of code. As if shit wasn't confusing enough for the poor guy, he and Gina are also attacked by a gang of assassins, in a sprawling car chase through Berlin and several shoot outs. Martin must find out who he is, why the hell someone is impersonating him, why angry Germans are out to kill him, and why his bimbo of a wife is ignoring him.

If only all taxi drivers were as hot as Diane Kruger...

Martin slowly but surely begins to realize what is going on around him, and events will ultimately lead up to a thrilling, explosive climax. Without going any further into the plot, I'll state that the story has its good share of twists and turns, and never lets up on the tension. Although some of the twists are a bit obvious, the movie had me guessing several times and it all adds to the fun of the movie. Neeson is great at portraying the conflicted Martin Harris, and Diane Kruger does a good job as well. By far my favorite role was Jurgen, played by the excellent Bruno Ganz, who did a fantastic job as Adolf Hitler in Downfall and is just a very, very convincing actor. The rest of the cast was okay, but nothing else really stood out from the film.  

Somebody's gonna get stabbed.

Unknown draws inspiration from several other flicks, but sticks to its own guns enough to make the movie refreshingly original and interesting. Aside from some obvious half-assed CGI near the end, it looks as slick as any other action blockbuster you'd expect. The ending was satisfying enough, and wraps up things quite nicely. It's a good return to form for Neeson, who has by now firmly established himself in the parthenon of ass kicking leading men. Let's hope he keeps his game up.


TL;DR - Liam Neeson's back in ass-kicking mode, and yes, it's wonderful - 7.5/10

SOURCE CODE (2011) - Bombs (and time travel) on a train

For the last couple of years the world of movies has taken over by sequel mania. It's been a never ending stream of sequels, remakes, "re-imaginings" or blatant rip offs of older movies and it shows no sign of stopping. There's been a few good ones, but also a whole bunch of terrible ones. Every once in a while, we get a decent, original story and it's always a breath of fresh air. 2009 had Duncan Jones direct Moon, which was a good sci fi flick and had an interesting concept and terrific performance by Sam Rockwell. Jones now turned his attention towards the action scene and his new film is one of the best movies this year.

I hope you like explosions, Jake.

Source Code opens with Colter Stevens (Jake Gyllenhaal) waking up on a train, with no memory of how he got there or why. We learn that Colter is an Army helicopter pilot and has been in combat in Afghanistan, and apparently is one tough bastard seeing as how he survived a disastrous mission and saved the life of his buddies. Across from him sits Christina (Michelle Monaghan), who starts a conversation with him despite the fact he has no idea who she is. Confused, Colter makes his way to a bathroom where he is shocked to discover his reflection on the mirror shows the face of another man. A bomb explodes on the train, killing everyone on board, and all of a sudden, Colter wakes up inside a dark, capsule looking thing with a uniformed woman (Vera Farmiga) speaking to him on a computer monitor.

I'd ride an exploding train to sit with Michelle any day of the week...

Colter is told that he is in fact working inside the Source Code, a rift in time that allows a user to re-live the last 8 minutes of a person's life. He has been placed into the body of Sean Fentress, a teacher and passenger on the train, to try and find out who has put the bomb on the train. Colter must find the people responsible and prevent an even bigger nuclear attack against a major city. He is placed back into the Source Code and each time he relives the last 8 minutes, but small differences begin to appear, as he starts to predict things like accidents, things people say, etc. Colter also begins to doubt the official explanation given to him by Vera Farmiga's character, and he not only has to stop the bombing, but also investigate just why they won't give him any more information about where he is or about the project's secretive boss (Jeffrey Wright).

... and then instantly regret it.

At first the glance, the plot might seem a bit confusing, but if you've seen movies like Memento or The Prestige, you'll know that by paying attention it really isn't all that hard to follow along. Gyllenhaal does a great job with his role, showing both the take charge side of his soldier character and the confused side of the guy inside the Source Code capsule. He is surprisingly convincing as a grizzled veteran, and does his action scenes pretty well. Michelle Monaghan is in most of the movie, and does a great job with adding little changes to her constantly replayed scenes. Everyone else puts in a decent effort as well. The real highlight is the thriller basics in the story. The movie plays out like a fast-paced action flick but has some great plot points that leave you wondering.

Lady, who the hell are you?

It is refreshing to see a nicely crafted action movie that doesn't include Shia LeBeouf, the number "2" in the title, or relies on some shitty 3D to sell movie tickets. Source Code is a damn enjoyable movie and it kept my attention throughout the whole running time. It's pretty smart and provoking as far as most action flicks go, and has likable leads and manages to make Jake Gyllenhaal a convincing action hero for the most part. My only real gripe was the fact that I didn't really love the ending, as I was expecting them to go in a whole different way with it, but it suits the movie just fine. Recommended.


TL;DR - Maggie's brother tries to save the day, 8 minutes at a time - 8.5/10

STRIKING DISTANCE (1993) - Willis, serial killers, and boats

As a huge action movie addict, it's no surprise I'm a big Bruce Willis fan. I think Die Hard might be the best action movie of all time, and most of Willis' other movies are pretty cool too and he's rightly regarded as one of the all-time classic movie tough guys. He beats people senseless, gets hammered drunk, shoots at least twenty guys per movie and always has great one-liners. That being said, I had never heard of Striking Distance before this week. No one ever recommended it to me, I never saw it on T.V., never even saw it on a Blockbuster shelf. So while cruising Imdb.com I saw it listed in Willis' filmography, so I figured, what the hell, it was probably worth a watch and set out to find a copy.

Just cruisin' with pop.

Tom Hardy (Bruce Willis) is a veteran cop with a big problem. He testified in a police brutality case against his partner, who just happens to be his psychotic cousin Jimmy DeTillo (Dennis Farina). Hardy comes from a family of police officers, with his father, uncle and two cousins serving as officers in the Pittsburgh police department. After Jimmy is found guilty of police brutality, every cop in town turns against Tom, considering him a traitor and a rat for selling out one of their own. In midst of all of this, Tom has been investigating a series of grisly murders of young girls by a killer known as the Polish Hill strangler. The investigation is going nowhere, with very few leads, but Tom believes that the killer is definitely a cop because of the way he always manages to stay several steps ahead of the police.

Sarah Jessica Parker is surprisingly hot as a cop. It's the uniform.

Driving to a police function with his father, they respond to an emergency call claiming the Polish Hill serial killer has been spotted. They join the high speed chase of the subject, nearly killing themselves several times and finally end up ramming the killer off the road, smashing both the cars in the process. Tom passes out, and wakes up to find his leg torn to shit and his father dead of a gunshot, with the killer nowhere in sight. After recovering from his injury, he's transferred out of the regular force and sent to the River Rescue unit as punishment for questioning the Polish Hill investigation. Tom is assigned a new partner, Jo Christmas (Sarah Jessica Parker), who he dislikes at first.

Meet Jimmy: Tom's psychotic, police-brutality loving cousin.

It's not long before more bodies start to show up in the river, and now it's apparently become personal, because all of the victims are women that Tom knew in the past. Tom and Jo begin to investigate the murders, and Tom becomes suspicious of Danny DeTillo (Tom Sizemore), his cousin and brother to the dead Jimmy, who dropped out of the force and has a lot of bad blood with Tom. Despite the  fact the police force hates his guts, Tom digs deeper into the murders and begins to doubt the official story about his father's killer, the identity of the Polish Hill serial killer, and the fact that his uncle and cousin might not be all the seem to be.

Little known '90s fact: cars could fly.

Even though Striking Distance might sound like it's got a complicated plot, it really doesn't. The story is pretty predictable, and I guessed the big plot twist near the end really early in the movie. Basic story aside, most of the characters aren't really interesting. Tom is a classic Bruce Willis cop character, with drinking problems, bad relationships with women, etc. Sarah Jessica Parker mostly just fills the love interest role and looks good in her dress or underwear. The villain, who I won't reveal even though the reveal is pretty obvious, isn't that good either. The best parts of the movie are undoubtedly when the action kicks in: the car chases and boat chases are good stuff, really frantic and some slick camera work. Surprisingly, the gun play is kind of low level for a 90s action flick, but what little there is makes up for it. Any music there might have been was totally forgettable.

The classic Bruce Willis shooting face!

Striking Distance is a basic action movie which doesn't even come close to matching the Die Hard series of awesomeness. The plot drags along and there just aren't enough thrills to make up for a weak story and even weaker cast apart from Willis and Sarah Jessica Parker. I enjoyed it, but wouldn't go out of my way to watch it again. It's just not that good.

TL;DR - Tries and fails to match Die Hard's excitement. Not bad, but not good either - 5/10

CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER (1994) - Han Solo takes on the drug war... and wins.

America loves spy movies. America also seems to love Harrison Ford, as it rightly should, seeing as how he was Indiana Jones and Han Solo. It's reasonable then, to expect that Tom Clancy's political/military thriller novels make for decent viewing and successful box office. Harrison Ford plays Jack Ryan again, after Patriot Games, and this time is forced to fight Colombian cartels and assholes in his own country's government.

Harrison Ford don't take no lip from no one. Yeah, I used a triple negative. U mad?

As the film opens, a Coast Guard cutter chases down a luxury yacht which has been taken over by thugs. When the officers come aboard, they discover an American family murdered, including the head of the family, a close friend of the President of the US. The investigation reveals that the guy was in fact in over his head with after stealing money from the Colombian drug cartels, but President Bennett (Donald Moffat) is pissed to high heaven and begins to plan for revenge. He orders his senior advisor James Cutter (Harris Yulin) to start a secret operation to attack the cartel with special forces soldiers. In the meantime, Jack Ryan, an analyst working for the CIA, is promoted after his boss Admiral Greer (James Earl Jones) is hospitalized with cancer. As a result, Ryan becomes involved with the revenge operation after he is duped into fooling Congress into giving money for the entire plan, and indirectly lying to them.

Protip: rocket launchers > Chevy Suburbans.

Planning the entire operation is Ritter (Henry Czerny), a career bureaucrat and all-around son of a bitch. Everyone around him seems to hate him. I don't blame them. Anyways, Ritter recruits John Clark (Willem Dafoe) to lead the soldiers into Colombia, where they soon begin to blow the hell out of everything they find: drug labs, contraband airplanes, killing drug lords, etc. Soon, they've blown up enough shit that the cartel is in a serious hurt and drug kingpin Ernesto Escobedo (Miguel Sandoval) strikes a deal with the US government to betray their own soldiers. Jack Ryan is forced to try and bring the conspiracy to light, expose the traitors and do what he can to save the G.I.s on the ground in Colombia.

"Target, hot chick sunbathing. Range 400 yards. She's a butterface, sir."

Clear and Present Danger has most of the elements we expect to see in political thrillers on the screen: corrupt government officials (in this case, the President), conspiracy and backroom dealings, innocent people getting caught in the crossfire, and of course, the average Joe trying to bring everything to light. I haven't read the novel it's based on, so I can't comment on how faithful the story is to the book, but as a standalone film it works well enough to hold your attention and create tension. The pacing is quick and the movie has some good action sequences, especially the Colombian ambush and the smart bomb assassination. The roles are well cast: the guy who plays Ritter is a convincing jerk, and Ford does a good job as usual. The stand out in my opinion is Willem Dafoe as the unhinged Clark, who knows he's been betrayed and is looking for someone to take it out on. Dafoe was born to play crazy, psychotic characters. This was a great role for him, even if it is pretty strange to see him play a good guy for a change.

This is Ritter. He wears suspenders. He is an asshole.

This flick is decent, and overall is an enjoyable thriller in the Clancy series. It's no Hunt for Red October, but it is a step above the other movie with Ben Affleck and Patriot Games. It's an enjoyable watch if  you're in the mood for the genre, and it has enough story going for it that it will keep you entertained and guessing until the end.

TL;DR - Colombians, politicians, cocaine, and guns. Sounds like a party. - 6.5/10

CHAIN REACTION (1996) - Keanu outruns a nuclear blast. Twice.

A word of warning to you, the readers: if you hate Keanu Reeves with every single fiber of your body and a passion that burns brighter than a thousand red giant stars, avoid this movie like you'd avoid Bubba in the jail showers. This isn't just a Keanu Reeves movie. This is the Keanu-est movie ever made. You might be thinking, " but, Guy Movie Blogger, surely you jest!" But sadly, no. He displays the same constipated look in every scene. He delivers every line with his world famous expressionless, monotone voice. Best of all, he looks bored to death regardless of the situation. A friend gets shot? Poker face. Car gets stolen? Poker face. His nipples catch fire? Poker face.

Even a shit-tastic movie can be slightly improved by Rachel Weisz.

As is typical in most 90s action movies masquerading as thrillers, Chain Reaction tries to pretend it's a smart movie and deals with government conspiracies and throws some science mumbo jumbo about cold fusion at you. Eddie Kasalivich (Keanu Reeves) is a machinist at the University of Chicago, working alongside physicist and obvious love interest Lily Sinclair (Rachel Weisz) as part of a team trying to create bubble fusion as a means to provide for a plentiful and cheap supply of clean energy. Leading the project is Paul Shannon (God... err, Morgan Freeman) who seems to be a big wig of some sort and has all the hook ups with the government for funding the experiments. Staying up late to work, Eddie discovers a breakthrough for the experimental machine, and with Eddie's machine parts, the next day the team celebrates their first stable bubble fusion reaction.

The team breaks out the Dom Perignon and get smashed drunk to enjoy their success. There is however, something rotten in the state of Denmark, as they say.The party ends and, Eddie, being the gentleman that he is, walks the wasted Lily home after her piece of crap Volvo refuses to start. After taking her drunk ass home, he heads back to the lab to get his motorcycle. Arriving at the compound, Eddie investigates the alarms going off inside, and finds his mentor Dr. Alistair dead and another researcher, Dr. Chen (an Asian guy, in case you were wondering) missing. Even worse, the fusion reactor set to explode in a matter of minutes. Eddie makes a run for it and hops on his bike, speeding away from the lab until the reactor explodes in a huge atomic blast, which he then outruns on his motorcycle.

Keanu Reeves outrunning a nuclear explosion while constipated. How's that for multitasking?

After a few square blocks of prime Chicago real estate are reduced to rubble, the FBI show up to investigate, and the first to be questioned is poor Eddie. Leading the investigation is Agent Ford (Fred Ward) and his fat assistant who I will not bother to name, seeing as all he does in the movie is be fat and nod or agree with whatever Agent Ford says.  Eddie is released and meets up with Lily, where they soon realize that someone is framing them for the explosion and murder of Dr. Alistair. Money and messages to China are planted at their places, and they're forced to reach out to the program director Paul Shannon for help. Shannon urges them to surrender, but they refuse and are soon on the run, avoiding the FBI and trying to clear their names at the same time. Shannon seems to be involved in shady stuff, and it's ultimately up to Eddie and Lily to find out who was behind the attack and how they can be stopped.

Fred Ward trying his best to be Tommy Lee Jones. Note the fat man in the background.

The protagonist has been framed? One of his closest friends murdered? An ally may not be what he seems? A tough cop on his trail? Hmmm... that sounds eerily familiar to this little ditty of a blockbuster called The Fugitive. Except of course, that Andrew Davis directed both of these movies, and was apparently happy to take liberal chunks out of that movie to make this one. It mostly works, in the sense that Chain Reaction has good scenes with plenty of tension and action, and the chase scenes are well done. Everything else just seems like a tired rehash of stuff you've seen before. There's only so many ways this kind of story can be told, and unless the guys behind the camera take a ballsy approach like in No Country For Old Men, a movie like this can't help but feel derivative. I'd say the only real highlight of the movie is Morgan Freeman, who makes any scene feel a lot more important than it really is by virtue of his badass voice.

Brian Cox arguing with God.

The best way one could describe Chain Reaction is by saying that it's a lot like eating a bag of Doritos. It's lightly filling and pretty enjoyable even though you know they're bad for you. After you're done, you're left wondering why the hell you just ate them and trying to figure out how to get that damn Nacho Cheese residue off your fingers. Chain Reaction tries really hard to be The Fugitive and to make a Harrison Ford out of Keanu. It fails on both counts, especially in the later. For god's sake, a beach ball has more charisma than Keanu in this flick. As a way to kill off a few boring hours though, you could do a whole lot worse. After all, you could be watching Burlesque...

TL;DR - Keanu discovers fusion. Keanu never smiles. Keanu runs from things. - 5/10

BURIED (2010) - Being buried alive sucks. Even if you're Ryan Reynolds.

It seems like Ryan Reynolds has apparently made a career out of romantic comedies. Go to a Blockbuster (if there's any still around) and walk over to the romance aisle and close your eyes. Pick out a random DVD and there's a good chance it'll have his face with a quirky smile, his arm around some chick, and a fantastic title like Definitely, Maybe. If you're really lucky, the cover might even have some kids on it. Luckily, there is light at the end of the tunnel. Now that he's becoming richer and more famous, he's been taking on better (better as in, more fighting, shooting, exploding things, etc) roles like Deadpool, a Blade sequel and the upcoming Green Lantern.

Even Ryan Reynolds gotta eat...

Buried is one of his latest movies, and is simply one of the most tense and exciting movies to come out in 2010. Normally when you hear the words "foreign" and "Indie," you think of shitty dramas or some hipster art film about a girl who collects dead birds and falls in love with a gay record store owner. Thankfully, there's no need for such worrying here.  The premise of the movie is simple enough: Paul Conroy is an American truck driver, working as a contractor in war torn Iraq. He wakes up one day, much to his chagrin, inside a fucking coffin. Spanish director Rodrigo Cortés manages to make 94 minutes of a guy stuck inside a box seem like a roller coaster ride. ¡Viva España!

Buried alive with no decent games on your phone. What the hell could be worse?

The movie starts with no introduction and no explanation. Paul wakes up in the pitch black, fumbles around and has a panic attack. He finds his lighter, flicks it on, and to his horror realizes he is inside a coffin. At first, he has absolutely no idea why he's been.... well, you know, buried alive. To his surprise, his BlackBerry is still on him. Piece by piece he manages to recreate what happened to him the day. He remembers that the convoy he was driving in was ambushed by insurgents. The rest of the drivers were murdered, and Paul had such shit luck the Iraqis decided to have a good laugh and bury him alive. He manages to get in contact with the FBI, his employers, and eventually his wife. Things however, might not be exactly as they seem. At first, no one believes his story. His employers are somewhat sketchy, the FBI investigator doesn't sound too convincing, and to make things worse, he gets a phone call from the asshole terrorist who put him in the box to begin with. Oh yeah, the guy wants a $5 million ransom or he'll let Paul suffocate to death.

Claustrophobic? Sucks to be you, Paul...

Paul will have to deal with the FBI trying to find him, the terrorists trying to get their ransom, his employers trying to wash their hands of the whole ordeal, and the slow death of his cell phone battery. There's a few good twists around the halfway part of the movie that had me wanting to high five someone. Needless to say, this is an intense movie. Scenes move quickly, and things begin to spiral out of control at what seems to be a frantic pace. Reynolds does a great job with his role, as we see Paul run through the whole gamut of emotions you'd expect from some poor average guy stuck in the middle of some Middle Eastern hellhole, buried in a box underground and tortured over the phone by a gruff voiced Iraqi. Despite the limited setting, the camera moves around a lot, and there are some very cool scenes inside the coffin, which contrasts nicely with the drama that comes from Paul's phone conversations.

FOREVER (BURIED) ALONE.

Although it's somewhat of an unknown indie film, Buried was among the best movies of 2010 - it stuck to its premise very well and delivered a fresh take on the thriller genre that lately has been turning out loads of crap upon crap. It's fun. It's thrilling. It's somewhat unpredictable. Reynolds does a stand-up job and keeps your attention despite the fact you'd expect people would get sick of seeing a single face throughout the entire movie. The pacing is very fast, the tension very well done, and the ending was one of the most satisfying I've seen in a long while. It's a shame this flick went under the radar for most people. Definitely recommended.

TL;DR - Buried alive in the Iraqi desert by terrorists with only a cellphone for company. Damn what a rush - 8.5/10