'Blu-ray or Bust' - CRIMINAL

'Blu-ray or Bust'

CRIMINAL (2016, R, 113 minutes, SUMMIT ENTERTAINMENT/MILLENIUM FILMS)

Smart action thrillers should be celebrated when they are done right.

They should be held above the regular action crap that Hollywood throws up every summer, regurgitating ideas and one-liners like an old lady that ate too much bad potato salad at the Bingo Hall Pot Luck. Occasionally, one of those pieces of fluff turns out to be a lot more entertaining than you’d expect—when the first THE EXPENDABLES came out, it was a hell of a lot more fun than it had any right to be. By the third one, the idea had worn thin, and the “franchise” had become just another bad side dish in the same genre it poked so much fun at in the beginning.

But I’m talking SMART action films—ones that have intelligence in the writing, the plot, and the characters. Classics are DIE HARD, THE TOWN, and half of the “James Bond” and “Jason Bourne” films. There is a different feel to all of them, a certain sophistication to the choreography and the set-pieces, which all compliment the characters and the actors playing them. Done right, the smart action thriller can be emotional, edge-of-your-seat entertainment.

CRIMINAL tries hard to live up to some of its predecessors, and while it falls short in a few areas, it proves itself to be a rather smart addition to the genre. Kevin Costner plays “Jericho”, a prison inmate that is implanted with the memories of a dead CIA operative (Ryan Reynolds). Jericho is a bad dude, and having the memories of a good guy screws up his head. Costner is like a social Frankenstein, and watching him grapple with suddenly having a conscience where he once lacked all sense of right and wrong is fun to watch. Seeing Costner struggle with the invading id is what gives this film its heart, and keeps you watching. It is when he isn’t on screen that the film starts to lose focus.

The villain, a loco Spanish guy that wants to topple the various governments of the world, is played with a bit too much insanity by Jordi Mollà (RIDDICK). He does his best to derail the mood and atmosphere of the film, but thankfully, we have Costner to fall back on. Besides the star of the film, there is another saving grace—that of the subtle brutality of Antje Traue’s (MAN OF STEEL, SEVENTH SON) “Else”, a hit-woman which proves that not every right-hand goon has to be a testosterone infused male. Tommy Lee Jones and Gary Oldman round out the cast, but they are one-note characters, playing parts not much different than they have before.

The special features include deleted scenes, and a forty-minute long “behind the scenes” doc that talks to just about everyone in the cast and the folks behind the cameras. Any doc that includes a look into the composing of the soundtrack gets a big nod from me; usually, it is just a bunch of actors stroking each other’s egos backstage (there is some of that here, of course, but there are also some interesting facts about this particular cast you might not have realized at first…). This is an action film, so if you are going to watch it, you should do so on the Blu-ray format. The explosions are pretty, London is pretty, and the soundtrack is just as essential a component as the other technical aspects.

While CRIMINAL may not be the best film ever made, it certainly deserves your attention. Without Costner as the lead, this would have been just another summer flick. Enjoy the casting genius before Stallone starts hiring him.

Grade: B

Special Features: A

Blu-ray Necessary: Definitely

-- T.S. Kummelman