Assault on Precinct 13

ASSAULT ON PRECINCT 13 is aggressively mediocre.

The film hits every mark, goes through all the motions, like it's trying very hard. Hard as it may try, however, it simply cannot muster the tension it's trying to achieve. We know who the traitor is the minute we see him. We know who's going to die, and pretty much in what order. We know exactly how the hero's arc will play out, and we even know how the antihero's arc will play out.

As the hero, Ethan Hawke shows us nothing we haven't seen before. As the antihero, Lawrence Fishburne is convincingly portrays a one-note actor. As the various targets trapped inside the titular precinct house with our anti/heroic duo, Monica Bello, Drea de Matteo, John Leguizamo, Brian Dennehy, and "I've seen that guy before" guy Matt Craven all show up, do their jobs, and go home.

While not a terrible film, ASSAULT ON PRECINCT 13 has little to recommend it. It may be just thing to have on in the background while doing chores, but I wouldn't sit down for it again.

Deja Vu

I liked DEJA VU well enough, but I never lost track of time and I never got swept away.

DEJA VU should be the kind of movie that I go for: a thriller with a science fiction twist. It has a clever script, a likeable cast, and a healthy respect for the laws physics (not that it lets those laws get in the way of the story, but it does at least tip its hat to them). It's script is of the type whose scientific genius, when calling for more power for his time-travel gizmo, shouts, "I'm gonna need more cowbell!" It stars the reliable Denzel Washington, who really needs to do a romantic comedy for a change, and noted time travelling veteran Jim Caviezel makes a fine, if rather one-dimensional, foil. Its understanding of the physical universe struck me as plausible, which is rare for a time-travel movie, but there's something about it ...

I never really bought Washington as an ATF agent with an expertise in explosives. I was ready to, but then the film uses him as the audience surrogate for the exposition about time-warping device. By forcing him to ask dumb questions and come off as anti-intellectual, the film makes him dumber than he could be and still do his job. Additionally, I never felt for the distressed damsel, a woman whose sole character trait appears to be that she looks good in underwear. Finally, the movie itself jumped and danced and exploded so much that it kept reminding me that it was a movie and not a portal into its particular sliver of space-time.

My God: what's happening to me? I'm digging movies about the Queen of England's bad week more than movies about stuff blowing up. Before I know it, I'll start listening to soft rock.