Starring: Russell Crowe, Elizabeth Banks
Director: Paul Haggis
122 mins
Rating: GO!
Hollywood remakes of foreign films are normally disastrous (ie. Let The Right One In
), or just not as good as the original (ie Infernal Affairs (Wu jian dao)
. Fortunately for The Next Three Days I haven't actually seen the original French version, Anything for Her ( Pour Elle ), which seems to have a pretty good rating on IMDB. Normally I would say don't go: watch the original, but in this case your hard earned cash is worth investing in this zippy thriller.
By no means a classic, Haggis keeps the action flowing from start to finish in this tale of a school teacher (Russell Crowe) driven to desperation in attempting to break his wife out of jail. The emotion of the situation is played out well, I felt genuinely sorry for Crowe and his predicament. I mean what do you do when your wife is banged up for life and you have a young kid to look after? If your hoping for some sort of kitchen sink misery fest of a man raising a family in isolation then your going to be disappointed. Crowe takes the much more difficult option of jail breaking his wife, as opposed to the more pragmatic option of hooking up with Aisha Hands and forgetting about the whole thing.
With the scene set the tension cranks up with Crowe coming up with various plans based on the advice from a prison break sage (an always reliable Liam Neeson). This includes one particularly well played out scene involving a bump key. By the way, I Googled this and surprisingly these actually exist, extra points for plausibility. Although plausibility never gets in the way of a good story in Hollywoodland, and it comes very close at times to forfeiting its good will, the way the police miraculously manage to get on Crowe's tail is particularly unlikely and jars with the film.
Nevertheless, this is an entertaining movie. Not a must go classic, but an interesting distraction, well acted, well put together. Rowena remained awake through its entire duration, which is some sort of endorsement. You won't feel cheated out of your money especially now when there isn't a great deal on, Burlesque anyone?
Director: Paul Haggis
122 mins
Rating: GO!
Hollywood remakes of foreign films are normally disastrous (ie. Let The Right One In
), or just not as good as the original (ie Infernal Affairs (Wu jian dao). Fortunately for The Next Three Days I haven't actually seen the original French version, Anything for Her ( Pour Elle ), which seems to have a pretty good rating on IMDB. Normally I would say don't go: watch the original, but in this case your hard earned cash is worth investing in this zippy thriller.By no means a classic, Haggis keeps the action flowing from start to finish in this tale of a school teacher (Russell Crowe) driven to desperation in attempting to break his wife out of jail. The emotion of the situation is played out well, I felt genuinely sorry for Crowe and his predicament. I mean what do you do when your wife is banged up for life and you have a young kid to look after? If your hoping for some sort of kitchen sink misery fest of a man raising a family in isolation then your going to be disappointed. Crowe takes the much more difficult option of jail breaking his wife, as opposed to the more pragmatic option of hooking up with Aisha Hands and forgetting about the whole thing.
With the scene set the tension cranks up with Crowe coming up with various plans based on the advice from a prison break sage (an always reliable Liam Neeson). This includes one particularly well played out scene involving a bump key. By the way, I Googled this and surprisingly these actually exist, extra points for plausibility. Although plausibility never gets in the way of a good story in Hollywoodland, and it comes very close at times to forfeiting its good will, the way the police miraculously manage to get on Crowe's tail is particularly unlikely and jars with the film.
Nevertheless, this is an entertaining movie. Not a must go classic, but an interesting distraction, well acted, well put together. Rowena remained awake through its entire duration, which is some sort of endorsement. You won't feel cheated out of your money especially now when there isn't a great deal on, Burlesque anyone?
Comments