Shoot 'Em Up (Part II)

http://www.avclub.com/content/cinema/shoot_em_up

Later that same rant…

First off, the movie isn’t that funny. Filling the film with “so bad, it’s good” one-liners, in the best/worst James Bond, Arnold Schwarzeneggar tradition, only works when you have a “so bad, he’s good” actor like Schwarzeneggar or Van Damme delivering them. Clive Owen is too good for the material. Imagine the scene in Predator where Schwarzeneggar throws a machete at a fleeing solider, impaling the poor sap against a wall, then saying, “Stick around.” Now imagine Cary Grant doing the same scene. True, this makes for a very interesting, peculiar mental image, but the scene wouldn’t work.

I wouldn’t have a problem with a film this violent or sadistic, necessarily, if it didn’t want you to enjoy it so. Saddling both Clive Owen’s and Monica Belluci’s characters with dead children to mourn for is a very strange, morbid decision – especially when they shag in the very next scene after Belluci tells Owen about her stillborn baby. And the film’s staunch anti-violence, anti-gun sentiment is terribly hypocritical because the film wants you to mindlessly enjoy Clive Owen mowing down hundreds of nameless goons with whatever firearm or carrot is readily available.

Enough ranting. Give it a rent and tell me what you think.