I will watch this movie forever and love this movie forever even if it’s only for the ending. I remember so clearly seeing it for the first time on the bigscreen. It was probably my first John Woo experience which could only have added to the surprise – I believe I originally went because it starred Dominique Swain, who I was eagerly awaiting in the then unreleased Lolita, and Nicolas Cage, who I’d seen and loved in The Rock. After three minutes I was almost in tears – the opening sequence doesn’t quite do that to me these days, but it’s still powerful. But the ending? Back then I was in buckets and still now I’m in buckets, I absolutely adore the ending of this movie.

It comes down to strong writing and great acting. This is an action movie so the characters need to be simple. But unlike most action movies, the writers here add the little things that make a simple action movie into a classic. See Leon and Speed. Those and this form the holy trinity of action cinema, I think. Here, the greatest invention is the way Special Agent Sean Archer (played by John Travolta, or by Nicolas Cage during the switch) brushes his fingertips over the faces of his family as a gesture of love. It’s so simple, but instantly humanising.

Coupled with John Powell’s Hans Zimmer-like score, it gets cheesy at times but, and this I can’t fathom or explain, it’s that mysterious good cheese that I can’t get enough of. I think maybe it’s that it’s clear that all concerned know it’s cheesy. There’s a great exposition scene early on that reminds of a really early scene in Panic Room – it’s the scene that explains everything and nothing, an entire scene of a MacGuffin. Sean Archer stands wondering how to catch Castor Pollux, and someone steps in and says, “Perhaps there’s some other way....” and it cuts direct to this bizarrely futuristic science lab where another new character steps in and explains the whole concept that makes the rest of the movie possible. In Panic Room, the scene even begins with a cheeky line, “It’s called a panic room….” There’s just something about this blatant presentation of exposition that saves movies like this from falling down on their ass. You put it all in one scene so you can save precious screen time for emotion and character.

Joan Allen, Nicolas Cage and John Travolta… will there ever be a better cast action movie than this? These days you get one star, maybe a good character actor like Buscemi in a supporting role, and some ex-television bimbos. Here, you get real acting. Again, something that totally saves the whole movie from falling on its ass.

Easily John Woo’s best English-language movie to date. He’s simply got to get some decent screenwriters to write something specifically for him again (I think I remember reading that the writers of Face / Off didn’t really know John Woo but decided to write the perfect John Woo movie anyway, and that became this).

This entry was posted on Sunday, June 13th, 2004 at 8:13 pm in Movie Reviews, unrated. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.