The Mechanic

OPENING: 01/28/2011

STUDIO: CBS Films

RUN TIME: 100 min

ACCOMPLICES:
Trailer, Official Site

The Charge
Someone has to fix the problems.

Opening Statement
How do you describe The Mechanic? At times exciting, at times revolting, Simon West’s film churns out sex and violence at an alarming, even despicable, rate and caters splendidly to its lowly audience. Those seeking senseless carnage and raunchy sex should enjoy the action on display. Personally I enjoy my action with a little more brains and a lot more character.

Facts of the Case
Arthur (Jason Statham) works as a full time assassin – his task entails killing people by making their deaths look like an accident. After years of being on his own, Arthur decide to take on a young protégé (Ben Foster) whose father (Donald Sutherland) has just been killed – by Arthur. The two develop an unlikely friendship, but soon find themselves on the run from the agency that hired them after a mission goes horribly awry. Arthur’s skills will be tested as he must decide how far he is willing to go to see the mission through.

The Evidence
A legion of papers could be written about Jason Statham’s films and the manner in which they conduct themselves. Statham, the man, remains a likeable brute, what with his roguish demeanor and raspy voice that makes him sound like an overseas version of Clint Eastwood circa 1970; the actor was built for action pics in the same way Meg Ryan was built for romantic comedy. Problem is, as Statham’s career progresses that likeability continues to bury itself beneath endlessly violent, sexist films that make Ah-nold Schwarzenegger’s action pictures of the 1980s look like episodes of Full House (in terms of morality).

Take, for example, a moment early in The Mechanic when Statham, playing Arthur, the lone wolf assassin who feels no remorse for the deeds he carries out, happens upon a sexy woman dancing in a bar. Arthur examines her like every macho hero would (by rubbing his mouth as though pining over a succulent steak) while she flirtatiously shakes her trunk in his direction. The two exchange a few words before jumping into the sack where a montage of flesh, breasts and rhythmic humping consumes the screen. The lady, having accomplished her task, gets up for some food, and has just gotten to the fridge when Arthur appears and declares, “I’m leaving.” The woman–I’m guessing a prostitute–shrugs, utters a few brief sentences and then disappears until our protagonist feels the needs to, ahem, clean his pipes later in the film. (In point of fact, the woman’s name is never mentioned.)

Such is the nature of Simon West’s (Con Air) The Mechanic, a dim-witted actioner drenched, for whatever reason, in a layer of overwrought sexual perversion and an almost intolerable hankering for bloody, repulsive violence. I haven’t seen this much senseless carnage onscreen since Sly Stallone’s The Expendables (also starring Statham), but at least that film had one positive female presence. The Mechanic’s female personalities, if you want to call them that, consist of the aforementioned prostitute, two porn stars, a woman at a bar who asks a man to abuse her sexually, and a flimsy assistant who generously offers herself to a large religious personality and whose only line is, “I’m eighteen.” Oh, I missed the two women who are held at gunpoint, and then nearly forced down the garbage disposal–only “nearly” because our society has yet to reach that level of perversion. Give us about five more years.

I understand these men aren’t heroes. Arthur kills people; Steve wants to learn how to kill people. Obviously neither will be shooting the breeze with honest folk anytime soon. And yet, there’s something telling when a film like The Mechanic manages to slime its way into theaters disguised as entertainment, carrying little in the way of value. People die, as they do in films of this genre, but there’s no point to them dying. After an assassination attempt goes awry, the victims’ guards pull out pistols and give chase. The sequence is splendidly shot, and well executed (in terms of style and tension), but I kept asking myself why that particular person would need guards with assault rifles–because if the guards didn’t have guns, then there would be no action.

At another point, bad guys armed with impressive firepower move in on Arthur at a boat house. Actually, what these men do is kill the man guarding the boat house, leave him in the water, drive away, then return once Arthur arrives (screeching tires and all), only to be duped because Arthur–get this–is hiding in the water! They don’t know that, of course, because if they did the movie would end.

Films like The Mechanic assume their core audience entails young, adolescent, ADD-hampered perverts who get off watching macho action stars engage in savage dick swinging contests. I, for one, want more and expect more. I don’t always need depth, or logic for that matter, as long as the film arrives at some sort of reasonable conclusion, or something akin to a point. The Mechanic doesn’t have a point, or purpose. It exists to demonstrate violence and to show off Statham’s muscular physique, and to demonstrate the ways in which women apparently live to service men.

Then again, I’d be remiss if I said I didn’t enjoy The Mechanic in spades. West, ever the showman, knows how to execute action scenes, having graduated from the Michael Bay school of “Money Shots.” The film looks great, and moves along at a nice pace. A brutal fight sequence between Steve and a rather large assassin had me riveted; as did an early scene involving a car jacker. Such sequences ground the film in a certain kind of reality, one in which Statham’s one-dimensional personality cannot exist.

Statham has long sulked through his pictures like a video game interpretation of Bruce Willis, except without the slick one-liners. He’s reached a point in his career, though, where his safety is never in doubt because he remains one step ahead of everyone else and refuses to display his weaknesses. The Mechanic throws him off buildings, pins him up against deadly shoot outs and vindictive personalities, but he cannot/will not die. He’s cooler than everyone onscreen; the women love him; the bad guys fear him. He fears no one. He drives the coolest cars, carries the coolest weapon. He’s a walking, living, breathing cartoon.

Steve, on the other hand, claws his way to the finale, bleeding, bruised and ragged. He makes mistakes, takes risks; you like him because Foster plays him with nerve-wracking energy. He could pop at any moment, or die just the same. His is the most realistic personality on display–Foster is riveting.

As such, the two actors never settle comfortably with one another onscreen. I cannot decide if this is a Jason Statham film bolstered (somewhat) by a terrific performance from Ben Foster, or a Ben Foster film weighed down by Jason Statham. Either way, The Mechanic, despite its technical bravura, never fully ignites.

There was a chance here to make a really good film, one that examines the life of an assassin and his young recruit, and then focuses on the consequences, if any, of their actions. Unfortunately, West and his screenwriters aren’t interested in such trivial things as character, plot, or logic. They want to make stuff blow up real good, and give men a reason to whoop and holler like idiots.

Mission accomplished.

Closing Statement
The Mechanic contains a plethora of action set pieces, some of which are quite exciting, but never really gels as a film. Ben Foster is wasted in a well-written role that belongs in another film, one that caters to a more intelligent crowd and not those who’ve become accustomed to Jason Statham’s one-note performances.

The Verdict
6/10

Death Race

Opening Date: 08/22/2008

STUDIO: Universal

TRAILER: Trailer

ACCOMPLICES: Official Site

The Charge
Get ready for a killer ride.

Opening Statement
It finally happened. Instead of waiting for a video game to be made so Hollywood could adapt it into a bad movie, Hollywood got impatient and made it itself. The results are predictably generic: explosions, bullets, dismemberments, scantily-clad girls and insane car crashes. So what exactly is the problem with that?

Facts of the Case
In the near future, the United States economy has collapsed. Unemployment is rampant, and society is holding on by the barest of threads. Private corporations now run all prisons in America for profit, and Terminal Island Prison has found great success in hosting Death Race, an internet-broadcast cage match between convicted inmates racing heavily-armored and weapon-toting vehicles throughout the prison grounds. The last man standing wins their freedom. The most successful and profitable racer for the prison, the masked Frankenstein recently suffered a large crash at the hands of his rival, Machine Gun Joe (Tyrese Gibson), and the ratings have been dropping steadily in his absence.

Jensen Ames (Jason Statham) has just finished working his last shift at a steel factory that has declared bankruptcy. Pocking his final measly wages, he returns home to his wife and newborn baby. A former race car driver, Ames’ career derailed due to his naturally criminal tendencies, but he is happy and content in the arms of his wife, who has him on the straight and narrow path. As he goes upstairs to check on his baby, a masked intruder enters the house and murders his wife. Ames is knocked unconscious and awakes with the bloody knife in his hand.

Framed for the murder of his wife, Ames is sentenced to Terminal Island, where he immediately attracts the attention of the icy warden, Hennessey (Joan Allen), who has read his file and wishes to recruit Ames to drive in Death Race. Ames initially refuses, but is unable to resist the lure of potential freedom, should he win. To his surprise, he is handed the Frankenstein mask. Unknown to the public, the last driver was killed inches from the finish line, and fans are still anxiously awaiting the much-lauded return of their favorite driver. A man in a mask can be replaced, and Hennessey is anxious to have her ratings star return to the track.

A prisoner only needs to win five races to earn their freedom, and the previous Frankenstein has won four races. Ames only needs to win one, and he is assured of an early release. But as Ames slowly gets his bearings in the deadly arena, he soon realizes the warden has no interest in allowing her successful driver to escape the Death Race. Worse, he begins to suspect that his presence in the prison—arriving shortly after the famous Frankenstein is killed in action—may not be a coincidence…

The Evidence
A brain-dead visceral modernization of a schlocky exploitation film, Death Race is empty, hollow, and embarrassingly entertaining. Death Race resembles less a film and more a large, live-action trailer for an upcoming video game; entirely artificial, mindless and ruthlessly fun. Cars chase each other through a desolate industrial warehouse environment, mounted with rockets and machine guns and oil slickers. They knock each other into rails, trigger glowing panels on the ground that “activate” their weaponry, and the last one surviving wins the Death Race. Unless you keep your druthers about you, you might find your hands unconsciously gripping your popcorn bucket, steering the cars left and right out of pure video game reflex.

Death Race has the complexity of a land mine. You step into the theater, some gentle pressure is applied, and within thirty seconds things are blowing up everywhere. Legs go flying. The sheer exploitative quality of it is frighteningly direct—almost pleasantly so. Franky, it’s nice to know where you stand with a movie. At no point does the film even attempt to engage your brain; this is a film of visceral gut reactions, of blood thirst and car chases and revenge and calamity. These are all autonomous reactions, like working your heart and lungs, requiring no activity from your mind in any way, shape or form. You simply sit back and watch things hit the fan

It is difficult to critique a film this straightforward and unforgiving honest. You can’t really fault Death Race for failing to engage the brain of its audiences any more than you could critique it for not having any musical numbers. For what it is, and for what it aims to do—create a gigantic, ninety-minute live-action video game—it does it quickly, effectively and entertainingly. The film opens with bullets flying, and it never stops until the credits roll. Any character and plot development is handled during the opening credit sequence, leaving the rest of the film unrestrained by such constricts. Within ten minutes, Ames has been introduced, framed for murder and tossed into jail, where he inherits the mantle of Frankenstein. No time for love, Doctor Jones!

The plot, such it as is, works in the most rudimentary of senses. Despite the inherent lunacy of the overall concept, the film obeys its own rules and carves out a nice, simple story: man gets framed for murder, man goes to prison, man gets blackmailed into Death Race, man races and destroys everyone in his path. Nice, easy and predictable. Most of the action sequences exhibit that nauseating shaky camera style that is so popular these days, but the sheer scope of some of the crash sequences are fist-pumpingly bodacious. The performances from the cast are entirely one-note, because they only have the one note to play, like a timpani player in an orchestra. They just bang and bang and bang on that drum. Statham can play this brainless action hero role in his sleep. The villain, played by Allen is so painfully nasty and bad, so over-the-top in her bitchiness that it leaves her ultimate comeuppance immensity satisfying. Her presence here is the biggest mystery of the film. On the one hand, what the hell was she thinking? On the other hand, as the audience, we are awfully glad she thought it, because she’s the only thing that even comes close to a satisfying dramatic performance here.

The biggest complaint that fans of the original Corman production will have with Death Race is that it lacks the dystopic humor of its seventies predecessor. Gone is the fascist America where television audiences hungered for pedestrian fatalities—instead, we have an internet webcast of convicted felons blowing each other up. Death Race is an entirely one-note affair and is totally bereft of the satisfying campy humor that made its predecessor such a rousing cult classic of exploitation cinema. In fact, the film bares little resemblance to its forbearer, save for the vaguest of concepts involving heavily armored and weaponized vehicles blowing each other up, and David Carradine, who contributes a voice-over cameo as the original Frankenstein in a nerdy nod to the original.

It is especially amusing to dissect the thin, skeletal plot to Death Race looking for some depth or satire. The film is so straightforward and action film-ish that there is almost no mental substance to be found anywhere. If there is any subtlety here to be had, it probably got run over by gigantic machine-gun-toting Mustang cars. The original film envisioned a fascist America where television audiences yearned for blood and carnage, but in the futuristic state of Death Race, set an embarrassing four years in the future, apparently audiences want a real-life video game. Stupid, to be sure, but consider it for a moment. After all, director Paul W.S. Anderson makes his living adapting video games into live action films, essentially bringing real-life video games to the big screen where audiences flood the studio coffers with endless streams of cash. Maybe there’s something to Death Race after all…

No, I changed my mind. There’s nothing here. Sorry. It was worth a try.

Closing Statement
Death Race sets the bar low and hurtles over it with ease. Cars crash, bullets fly, bodies splatter with reckless abandon; all exactly what the trailer promised. An Oscar winner it isn’t, but few films deliver exactly what they promise, and that counts for something. It might be a dumb video game-turned-action film, but Death Race may be the most straightforward and upfront film this summer. Plus, it’s one hell of a video game teaser trailer.

The Verdict
This one can probably wait for the video store, but darned if it wasn’t a fun way to kill ninety minutes.

6/10