Alex Cross (2012)

Oh snap. I'm about to cross Alex Cross. The trailer inferred ill effects should one attempt to do so, but what are my options? This is kind of what I do. Hopefully the towering manliness that is Tyler Perry isn't enough to cause my head to explode at the mere suggestion that I question his virility. I guess I'll take my chances and hope for the best.

"Alex Cross" was not a film that I was looking forward to by any stretch. I've never seen nor intended to see a single Tyler Perry movie despite him releasing roughly 47 of them every year, and my plans were happy and comfortable remaining exactly there. I don't think he's a good actor based on what I've seen of him, all his films looked asinine and boring, I hate the Eddie Murphy fat-suit schtick, he's kind of racist if you listen to him talk, and the fact that he is so transparently marketing a cut and paste product for his brainwashed fan-base consisting manly of white teenaged girls and has never been called on it is frankly irritating to me.

As you may know, this film is a reboot which follows the character of Alex Cross, who was played by Morgan Freeman in "Kiss The Girls" and "Along Came A Spider." Apparently those were such big hits that they felt a need to bring Cross back again. And they thought Tyler Perry was a good replacement for Morgen Freeman. I can't even make a joke about something that stupid. Anyway, Cross is a detective on the tail of a serial killer called "Picasso" (Matthew Fox) who seems to be targeting a business man, working his way up the chain to him, so to speak.

Cross will attempt to catch him using either the power of his massive intellect, or psychic ability. It's kind of hard to tell which one of those he possesses based on what I saw. I guess it's not that important, since by the end he doesn't really use his powers of deduction/magic to solve anything related to actually catching Picasso. He just kind of picks up a gun and goes Charles Bronson on him after the whole thing becomes overtly personal. So whatever. It doesn't really lead to anything anyone else couldn't have done with basic investigative competence.

Ah yes. "Perry's Untouchables," for sure.

"Alex Cross" is not going to break any new boundaries in terms of police dramas featuring psychos. It's all quite stock in a "Red Dragon" meets "In The Line of Fire" way. That's not to say it's bad, it's just recycled. And PG-13. It's a movie about a serial killer that's rated PG-13. That's always a good sign. But hey, it's got Edward Burns, Jean Reno and John C. McGinley. Those are some nice grabs for the supporting cast at least.

You know, I will give Tyler Perry the slightest bit of credit for trying to expand a bit and do something other than playing an old crazy lady, but right from the get go there's a problem with him being in this, which even from the trailer is clearly evident. The problem is that there is no way in this bizarre, messed up world that a guy like Tyler Perry is suited to be an action movie lead.

Maybe if he were cast as one of the IT guys, or the police chief, or a sidekick or something else where he didn't have to shoot a gun or look intimidating or anything involving punching someone else in the face I could have bought it. But as it is, we're supposed to not only believe that this doughy lump of smug is a competent police officer, but that he can run down and take out a guy like Picasso in hand to hand combat, which he does during the film's ludicrous climatic fight scene. I feel it necessary to inform you that earlier in the movie we saw Picasso utterly DESTROY an MMA fighter nearly twice his size. Like, nearly to the point of possibly killing him. With his bare hands. And this miniature, chocolate flavored version of the Stay Puft Marshmallow man is supposed to beat this guy? Please.

Oh honey no, put it down. You're going to hurt yourself.

There's actually something funny that happens every time we are meant to buy Tyler Perry being a badass. Every single time he's shown throwing a punch, or shooting a gun, or anything involving something other than talking, the camera goes into seizure mode like it's inside a dryer on spin cycle. One could easily chalk that up to it being yet another film trying to make the action "more intense" by making sure we can't see a thing, but I'm sure the real reason was so that we wouldn't notice Tyler Perry having a heart attack every time he was forced to raise his fist and swing.

And as you could probably guess, the end fight between Cross and Picasso is filmed so wildly shaky and cut so spastic that it's almost impossible to tell that Matthew Fox is basically standing still waiting to be hit. That's a good thing in the same way that if I had my face melted off, I wouldn't be able to see how hideous I was since my eyes would be gone. It is so pathetic watching the editing try to salvage the action scenes when it's clear the lead actor probably couldn't even put bread in a toaster without needing an oxygen tank. It's like I'm watching a Segal movie by accident.

Matthew Fox is the one shining light that breaks through the haze of cliched plot and Perry's paunch, however. Good gravy, this guy was awesome in "Alex Cross." I've never been huge on Matthew Fox, and I'm still convinced he's a C+ actor at best, since his only got two modes: dour and smirk. But he is in the wrong movie here. He and his character are far too awesome for the likes of "Alex Cross." He needed to be going up against Karl Urban in another "Dredd" movie or in the next "Mission: Impossible" or something. The shenanigans he's pulling off are nearly Bond Villain-esque in their over-the-top nature, and it's by far and away the most entertaining thing going on here.

I would have finished watching "Lost" if Jack had been this awesome as opposed to irritating.

Matthew Fox does provide the only shocking moments in "Alex Cross," one of which occurs in a scene that's all over the trailer but goes down in a much darker way than one would usually expect a scene like that to resolve. The film gets credit for that, but the PG-13 nature of the movie means that both scenes, particularly the one in the trailer, feel a bit neutered. The second scene, which could have been really gruesome, isn't even shown except for a blurry picture of the aftermath sent via text. Must have been a hell of a scene. Glad they didn't show it.

Oh yeah. This guy has no chance against the hulking powerhouse that is the guy who plays Medea.

And I don't mean that unless a movie is graphic that it's no good, but when a person gets a hole blasted through their chest with a large caliber bullet and there's literally not a single drop of blood to be seen or even a hole in their shirt, it tends to undermine what just happened because we can tell that "Alex Cross" is made for the kiddies, and we can't have them seeing scary blood in a movie about a serial killer.

There was another thing that really irked me as well. This was Tyler Perry's mother-in-law they call "Nana-Mama" (groan) who, when Cross goes commando and suits up to take out this crazy assassin, attempts to convey the "message" of the film. This "message" is basically that by taking revenge on this guy, he becomes just as bad as him, and that he won't be able to live with himself if he goes out and gets him. And sure enough the last shot of the movie conveys that he may not be able to move on, and that there's a big cloud hanging over him for what he's done. And you know, that may have been a valid point in another film, but there's one little problem that makes it kind of stupid: He's a goddamn cop. It's his job to stop people like Picasso.

I just wanted to punch Nana-Mama in the face. Her self-righteous judgement on Cross when he goes out to stop a guy MURDERING PEOPLE like his profession requires came across as extremely preachy and insulting. And while it was nice to see Cross basically tell her to piss off, it's clear that we as the audience should be siding with her. You know what? I don't want the people trying to stop serial killers to have second thoughts about turning the other cheek. I want them to stop the serial killers before I get tortured to death. How about that?

"Sorry, folks. I'd uphold the law and protect the innocent and everything but...well...Nana Mama loves her some Jesus so...you know. I'll be in car."

Of course, the end of this movie makes Alex Cross out to be a complete and utter scumbag who definitely and very illegally overreaches not only his professional jurisdiction but also his character's sense of morals, but it's not really having anything to do with Picasso. That happens at the end when Jean Reno's character turns out to be behind the whole Picasso thing (it was so obvious from the beginning), and Cross essentially sells him out to a drug cartel after setting him up. So the Cartel grabs Jean Reno to take him away and kill him. Most likely in a very horrible fashion. Nice, Cross. Very professional. And unnecessary.

I don't understand why that moral grey area was thrown in there at the last minute, like they needed to artificially create a dilemma. Cross didn't have to do that. He could have gone about getting Jean Reno's character in a more official capacity. He didn't have to go all thug-justice on him, and there wasn't really a good reason why he did it that way. In fact, it would have made far more sense for both the story and character to do it in an official capacity, because that's what Cross would probably have done based on the very trite characterization I was given with this film. He's mad, yes, but he's a good cop. At least he was for 95% of the film.

Did you know that Idris Elba was originally going to be Alex Cross? That I could have bought. And not that I need a reason to dislike Tyler Perry, but come on. I could have been watching a good actor here. That's not helping much. On top of that and the fact that he took out Matthew Fox, the only decent character in this whole debacle, it's a wonder I even watched it all the way through to the end after Fox buys it with 15 minutes left to go. Who cares after that point? Then it really is a Tyler Perry movie, and screw that.

If you want a good laugh, check out Tyler Perry trying to be hardcore. It's pretty funny.

THE BOTTOM LINE - "Alex Cross" is a movie whose biggest problem is bad casting for the lead. If the story had been R rated with someone other than Tyler Perry, the combination of that and Matthew Fox could have made for a halfway enjoyable thriller. But as it stands, it's just kind of there and gone with no real redeeming qualities. Tyler Perry should stick to his schtick so I don't feel any inclination to suffer through another one of his performances.

Man On A Ledge (2012)

It must be hard to be Sam Worthington. He's at the mercy of an insane person.

Think about it. His career has to wait for James Cameron, that anal-retentive, off-his-rocker-crazy perfectionist who takes 20 years between each movie in order for technology to catch up with his fever dream visions of making stuff that isn't real look still-not-real-but-boy-is-it-pretty-and-shiny. And Sam ain't doing jack in the meantime. The only time anyone cared about Sam Worthington was when he was in "Avatar," and it would appear that the only time anyone will care about him again is whenever Cameron makes the sequel. That's rough.

That may be a bit harsh, but come on. The biggest thing the dude's done in the 4 years since "Avatar" are the "Clash of The Titans" reboots. That is not exactly prestigious. And now we have "Man On A Ledge," which doesn't thrill and entertain so much as confirm my suspicion that Sam Worthington is trying guilt-trip James Cameron into making "Avatar 2" faster so that he can have a career.

 "Do it, Cameron! Do it or I'll jump! I swear I'll jump!"

Whatever. "Avatar 2" is still probably going to be crap, just like the first one was. Maybe this time it'll be a 4 hour long rip-off of "The Postman." Which would actually make that movie shorter, come to think of it.

I'm going to tell you straight out, for "Man On A Ledge," I'm going to spoil the crap out of this movie. I'm doing it because I don't care, and honestly, neither do you. You just don't know it yet. It's a dumb film that is under the impression that it's clever. Even with Ed Harris as the villain, which under any other circumstance would be awesome, it manages to also be boring. And the reason it's boring is because, going back to the first point, it's dumb. Although there might be something to be said about the entertainment factor of watching a train wreck.

The only way for me to try and make sense of any of this mess is to break it down into steps.

1) Businessman (Ed Harris) loses a lot of money during the economic collapse.
2) He sells his gigantic diamond to make some money to survive.
3) In an effort not to be humiliated, he frames a seemingly random cop (Sam Worthington) and says that he stole the diamond, cut it up into many pieces, and sold them.
4) Cop is convicted of this and goes to jail.
5) Cop and his brother set up this elaborate heist to break the cop out of jail and steal the diamond from the businessman, in order to prove that he didn't steal it the first time. Among other things, this plan involves the cop creating a huge distraction by standing on a ledge, and their father faking his own death and becoming a bellhop at the hotel across the street from the businessman's building. (Oddly enough, the father bit makes more sense since the only reason the ledge thing is necessary was to make a crowd cheer in order to make enough noise to cover up an explosion. If that's your plan, try harder.)
6) Absurdly, the plan actually works, up to the point where the brother and his girlfriend (two people who are not career criminals yet are pulling of "Ocean's 11" style heist-aerobics) find out that the diamond is not in the safe they thought it was in. At this point their plan is officially tits-up. Everything past this point couldn't have been planned by them.
7) The businessman, seeing that his security measures performed admirably and exactly as intended despite being penetrated, decides to take the diamond out of his super high tech safe that the thieves couldn't possibly break into and instead puts it in his pocket because...um...because...well...he's dumb.
8) The brother and his girlfriend break into the businessman's office and wait for him, since there is apparently no security leading to his office (what?), and steal the diamond off of him. Keep in mind, they did not know that he a) had another safe or b) had the diamond on him. And even if they did know that (which they couldn't) their entire plan hinges on him removing the diamond from the safe after the break-in. Which, even as flimsy plans go, is a stretch and relies on the businessman being galactically stupid.
9) In a beautify orchestrated series of hand-offs and tag team switcharoos involving their dad undercover as a bellhop, the brother manages to get the diamond into the hands of the cop.
10) Using crooked cops and a gun, the businessman gets the diamond back, making the whole switcharoo stuff pointless.
11) Using dumb luck and convenience, the cop manages to punch the businessman in the face and shows the diamond to everyone in a big crowd including the media, which apparently clears him from wrongdoing, exonerates him, and makes him a free man. They all have a drink.

And if there was any kind of sense or logic in this movie, step 12 would be that he goes to jail for stealing the diamond. Because here's the special thing about that little plan. Yes, it's true that it may clear you from that first charge when you hadn't done it. That's true. But there's still that second charge. You know, that time when you actually did do it? Yeah, you're going to jail for that. You are so sued. That would be some kind of record, wouldn't it? Going to jail for doing a crime you did to prove you hadn't done the exact same crime before?

He should write a book called "If I Stole The Diamond."

I mean, look at all the things he could be arrested for, which he absolutely 100% did do. There's escaping from jail, assaulting two police officers, creating a public disturbance, being an accessory to a robbery, assaulting a SWAT team member, assaulting the businessman, and destruction of public and private property which would probably factor in the hundreds of thousands of dollars of damage, if not millions of dollars. And let's not forget that he and his brother made, planted and detonated explosives on the roof of a building in New York City, which I'm sure would get him prosecuted under some kind of anti-terrorism act. This dude is going up the creek for sure.

But no, it's a movie, so proving that you were the victim once automatically clears you from any wrong-doing you do later. I like to call that the "Lisbeth Salander Defense." And it bugs the crap out of me every time it happens. Even when it's emotionally moving and what we'd probably like to see happen, like in "A Time To Kill."

But that just doesn't fly with me. As strong and sexy of a defense as Matty McC can give, Samuel L. Jackson totally shot Keifer Sutherland to hell, Noomi Rapace gladly tried to kill her father with an axe, and Sam Worthington did enough here to put him away for a few decades. Or at least as long as they put away weed dealers. Which is about the same, since justice is awesome like that.

"Come on, honey. Let's commit some crimes to prove our innocence."

But more to the point, there's some other utterly perplexing stuff going on here. Go back and look at #2. The businessman sold the diamond. That's how he got the money to keep him afloat during hard times. I don't think I'm misremembering anything with that, because they even say during one of the conspiratorial exposition scenes something like "Out of nowhere he gets $40 million. He's back on top." So that would imply that he sold it. Besides, if he didn't, why would he hide it? And what was the $40 million from if not the diamond? So that brings up a very important question that I don't remember the movie ever answering: How does he have the diamond in his safe if he sold it?

Perhaps he bought it back from whoever he sold it to, but I can't recall that ever being mentioned. And yes, it's true that I was kind of bored by "Man On A Ledge," but I wasn't bored to the point of missing out on a plot point like that. My lone vodka and tonic isn't going to make me miss it. I just think they either didn't think it was important enough to mention, or they just plain screwed up. I'll let you speculate, but you can go ahead and guess which scenario I find more likely.

"I have money. Don't ask questions."

There are two ways to go about looking at a movie like "Man On A Ledge." The first way of looking at it, and I think this is the manner in which both the filmmakers want you to watch it and the way the average movie goer actually does watch it, is that it's just a movie and we should all just let it roll over us and not worry about silly things like plot and making sense and all those trivial things that I get called pretentious for pointing out.

The second way to look at a movie is that yes, it does matter if a movie makes sense in its own universe. I'm not saying that every movie needs to have both feet firmly planted on the ground. I loved "Machete" for crap's sake, and that movie had its feet so far off the ground it could be hired to do repairs on low-orbiting satellites. I'm not saying a movie can't be fun or ridiculous or not worry about trivial stuff in the plot.

But a movie like "Man On A Ledge," which is obviously proud of its caper and working really hard to make a lot of pieces fit together throughout several *GOTCHA* moments can't really excuse itself by throwing its chips in with the outlandish absurdity of movies that were never meant to be taken seriously in the first place. I really believe "Man On A Ledge" wants to be totally serious.

Alright then, "Man On A Ledge." You want to be taken seriously? Then get ready to be looked at as such. You're proud of your caper? Fine. Explain to me how in the hell these seemingly average people with no mentioned training besides "breaking into nice houses back in high school" are able to pull of these heists like Ethan Freaking Hunt in "Mission: Impossible." Where did they get the gadgets? How did they get the intel on Ed Harris' high-tech vault? How are they able to even remotely pull off this insane job when Genesis Rodriguez's character, in fact all of them, are too stupid to have the foresight to realize that when you have a red-tinted flashlight, everything you're looking at is going to be tinted red, including wires you have to cut? Why did she apparently not even study the wiring diagram to know exactly which wire to cut? Instead she has to rely on Sam Worthington to coach her through it via radio, but she just ends up having to guess in the end anyway? Are you for real? Seriously, her jackass boyfriend just advices her to "Cut the reddest looking one." What a pro. Glad you planned that out. Why does the heat sensor in the vault room not pick them up when they've entered despite having taken no measures to counter it? Why does the floor sensor not set off the alarm since they're just walking around casually? Why is there a conveniently located human-sized ventilation shaft located on the ceiling precisely above the safe, leading to an easily accessible opening in the room next to it which is located ON THE GROUND?

Do I even need to bring up the question as to why she needs a flashlight when it's clearly lit in there?

This could actually be a pretty good parody of a heist movie if it weren't taking itself so seriously.

THE BOTTOM LINE - "Man On A Ledge," while not necessarily the worst made or produced film I've seen this year, is probably one of the more irritating in terms of how much more credit it gives itself than what it actually deserves. This is a dumb, dumb movie that makes no logical sense in even the simplest terms, and for a heist movie, which as a genre is one that depends on rigorous attention to detail in order to properly work, that's a big problem.