Alex Cross

This review of Alex Cross is brought to you, much like the movie, by Cadillac: The New Standard Of The World.  It is also brought to you by the letters F and the letter C for completely cliche.  This movie offers nothing original to the genre, the writing is filled with one liners.  The plot and characters seem more like they come from serialized daytime TV dramas than they do from James Patterson.  And the camera work is too stylized for its own good.  I don't know if I can find one redeemable moment from this movie but I will do my best.  Tyler Perry tries to step outside of his usual comfort zone and perform to a much broader audience but the product that comes out is far beyond his control of anything close to bearable.

Some of you may remember Alex Cross from the Morgan Freeman movies "Kiss The Girls" and "Along Came A Spider."  In "Alex Cross" he plays a younger version of the character.  One that got his start in Detroit before moving to Washington D.C. to become a renowned profiler.  Tyler Perry seems to be a natural pick for the movie, he has a huge following and one would hope that a movie like this could supply him with a broader audience.   There just wasn't much for him to grab onto with this role and for that his potential big push for more on-scene roles without the Madea suit may be put on hold.

The story can't get anymore simple.  It is brilliant cop vs. a sadistic killer.  The story seems more along the lines of an episode of  CSI than anything else.  The story has almost every cliche cop moment in there.  There is just no depth to this movie.  In his first walk through of the murder he is investigating he has the entire scene figured out.  But we as the audience, unless you are familiar with the character, have no background to set this up.  We are just supposed to accept he is brilliant and move on.

Afterwards come a series of awful one liners from partner Eddie Burns which helps us connect to his character.  But he is supposed to be a little dopey so not too much credit can be given for nailing the one part that is supposed to seem simple.  Then Cross goes back home to a family we have no emotional attachment to.

The entire movie is a paint-by-numbers cop movie, you know every role to the movie.  As soon as Jean Reno walks on the scene you know he is destined for be a more integral part of the plot. Matthew Fox looks the part of a dangerous psychotic having underwent an intense diet for the role.  Fox's physical transformation into the role was actually one of the things I was excited to see but as soon as he opens his mouth he seems as out of place as everyone else.

We are supposed to fear Matthew Fox and he shows how dangerous he can be in the opening sequence.  But in an attempt to gain a larger audience they keep the movie to a PG-13 rating.  So instead of seeing any of the violence you get highly stylized camera work that become more distracting than anything else.

The only moment that comes close to being surprising happens half way through the movie when someone close to Alex dies (I guess I should have said spoiler alert, but you're not going to see this movie so who cares).  But there is just no emotional attachment so what should come off as a tender and possibly tear inducing moment comes off as forced instead.

Hasn't Detroit gone through enough, just when you think they are getting somewhere with Detroit making the World Series a movie like Alex Cross comes out and they will have to claim it as its own.  Tyler Perry has no business being an action star and that is proven here.  But what may be most upsetting about the whole movie is that they have already green lit a sequel.  F

Argo

If Argo did anything besides make me grab a complete stranger in the movie theater for fear of the hostages lives, it was prove once and for all that Ben Affleck is a great director.  He has proven his stuff in the past with Gone Baby Gone and The Town, but Argo has affirmed that he can direct the crap out of anything.  It has the perfect mix of tension, action, drama, and laughs and may be one of the best movies I have seen all year.  You may expect a dry telling of a hostage negotiation you have never heard of, but Argo is a masterfully crafted story that will have you on the edge of your seat. 

The movie is a hodgepodge of emotions.  Going in I thought this would be a political drama mixed with action.  Here Affleck mixes everything from politics, to insider Hollywood humor, to a thriller-drama.  Anyone could have messed this movie up, but Affleck squeezes every possible drop of emotion out of every scene.   He captures the perfect feel of the movie, from panic in the embassy right down to a grainy camera work that movie goers would have seen in the late seventies.

Right as all the information seems overwhelming in DC, Ben Affleck's character Tony Mendez comes up with his plan to free the escaped hostages held up in a hostile Iran.  They plan to free the six that made it out of the embassy by going into Iran as a movie company looking to scout a desert location.  It is at this point that Mendez goes to Hollywood to create a back story for their fake movie.  There they meet two Hollywood producers played outstandingly by John Goodman and Alan Arkin.  Throughout the California scenes the dialogue is littered with inside Hollywood jokes that everyone in the audience is able to enjoy.  They create laugh out loud moments that help to relieve the audience from becoming too overwhelmed.  And while Goodman is good Arkin is great, he steals all the big laughs.  Laughs I wasn't even expecting to get when I first sat down to watch this movie.

If the first half of the movie is about the planning and the set-up then the last half of the movie is about the execution of the plan.  The drama and tension is set high in the first 10 minutes of the movie as the Iranians take over the U.S. embassy, so by the last 45 minutes of the movie I was literally on the edge of my seat and if I didn't biologically know I had to take in oxygen at least every three minutes I wouldn't be able to tell you if I breathed.  I didn't know this story at all before watching this movie, and since it was recently declassified chances are you didn't either.  My biggest suggestion is don't look anything up.  Allow this story to happen and allow yourself to experience the gamut of emotions that Mr. Affleck wishes you to experience.

The only mistake that Ben may have made is casting himself as the male lead.  I don't agree with all the criticism he has taken in the past about his acting, I actually believe he can be a good actor, especially when he is playing a d-bag.  Here he is supposed to be a patriotic stoic thinker.  And that is what he is, almost to a cardboard cut out precision.  He is so stiff in the movie, and it stands out even more by the cast he puts around him.  Even the hostages as unrecognizable actors do a better job than this household name.  I wonder if anymore could have been made of the movie if he had cast someone else in the lead, but hey he is directing, I'd probably cast myself too.

Argo has it all, and does a great job at hooking you into the material.  While every part of the movie was great, there was no point in which I was hoping they would cut to another scene.  I was engulfed in all of it.  Come award season expect some major praise coming for Argo.  A