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"It's Not Polite to
Point!" |
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Directed by Clark
Johnson - Written by
George Nolfi
Starring Michael
Douglas, Kiefer
Sutherland, Eva
Longoria, Kim Basinger
Distributed by FOX -
2006 - 108 mins - Rated
PG-13 |
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Jacob Hall's
Review
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D+ |
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Jack Bauer, Gordon Gekko and a desperate housewife walk into the White
House... |
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“The
Sentinel” seems to think that every improvement made in the thriller
genre in the past 30 years has not happened. It’s a film so flat and
clichéd that I couldn’t help but wonder when the script was written.
1945? 1952? Certainly before every aspect featured here became a
cliché. If not, than the screenwriters are just plain lazy.
We have the familiar plot: someone is going to assassinate the
president and the hero is framed and must run from the law, who slowly
realize that he is innocent and team up with him to fight the real
villain. Yes, that is very, very similar to many famous “chase”
movies, too similar, actually. The story feels like the inbred child
of “The Fugitive” and “In the Line of Fire;” you can tell that it
bears a resemblance to something good, but it’s deformed just enough
to be impossible to love.
If there is one thing unique about this film, it is that the main
character is a complete and total asshole. Michael Douglas plays
Garrison, a veteran Secret Service Agent who discovers a mole in the
organization and is then accused of being a traitor. He’s an
adulterous SOB with a one-track mind and, unlike Harrison Ford in “The
Fugitive,” there came a point where I just wanted him caught. Douglas
isn’t bad…but he really isn’t given much to work with so he reverts to
the role he always seems to play when cast in bland movies: Michael
Douglas. Kiefer Sutherland plays Jack Bau…I mean, Breckinridge, an
agent with a bone to pick with Garrison. Sutherland really just plays
a variation of his “24” character and since Sutherland is really,
really frickin’ cool, it works. Eva Longoria and Kim Basinger pop up,
too, but both don’t leave much of an impression. There’s even a
wisecracking, black agent who briefly shows up…but that’s more of a
comment about the script than the cast.
This script manages to pack in more clichés than framed man on the run
and a zany black man. There’s teacher VS student, impossible love,
third act plot twists, a character showing up at the crime scene and
making the cops look like fools with his infinite knowledge of murder
investigation, and, perhaps most insulting, a tidy little conclusion
that wraps up everything so just about every character is happy and
content.
The script may not have mattered if the direction was good, but, plain
and simple, it’s not. It’s sloppily shot, sloppily edited and sloppily
paced. Director Clark Johnson gives much of the action the “Bourne
Supremacy” treatment: shaky and nauseating. He even goes to far to
employ that dreadful extra-blurry slow motion that I last saw in the
otherwise magnificent “King Kong.”
As the plot twists and action took me toward an incomprehensible
climax, I felt something that I hadn’t felt in the movie theater since
Owen Wilson shot up some Russians in “Behind Enemy Lines.” I felt
myself start to fall asleep. The moment my eyes closed out of boredom,
I dropped the grade down from a C- to a D+. If I wanted to sleep, I
would save my money and do it at home. Not in a crowded theater. |
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© Written by Jacob Hall -
Email
Me! |
TC Candler's Comment
I thought
"The Sentinel" was very professional film. There
is nothing particularly superb or original about
it, but it executes all of its objectives with a
calm efficiency that makes it very watchable.
I concede that it is classically based on the
standard "fugitive" plot (one that has always
been a favorite of mine)... Still, I am going to
give it credit for never venturing into the
realm of silliness. The film never gets
ludicrous. It always stays within the confines
of reality -- a feat accomplished much less
often than not in this day and age.
It is not a film to add to the DVD collection,
but I found it an engaging afternoon thriller
that will be easy to watch whenever it pops up
on HBO. "The Sentinel" is a good movie that,
admittedly, never approaches anything higher but
never stoops to anything moronic.
Richard Propes' Comment
n/a
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