Hey folks, Harry here... Seems Capone has taken up beating on the heavy Cinematic Everlast Bag... Joel Schumacher. One has to wonder how far away his Academy Award for Best Director is... After Akiva won for A BEAUTIFUL MIND, I think we all pretty much agreed that anything can and often will come to pass. Here's Capone, pounding it like George Foreman in Zaire...
Hey, Harry. Capone in Chicago here with a bit of good news for an anxious world.
America can rest a little easier tonight: Joel Schumacher is back to making shitty movies. That’s right, the man who single-handedly killed the successful Batman franchise is back with the stupendously tired and rehashed BAD COMPANY. This is not the Schumacher who took a few chances (at least commercially) with films like 8MM, FLAWLESS, and TIGERLAND (which never even opened in Chicago). No, this is the BATMAN FOREVER, BATMAN & ROBIN, DYING YOUNG, THE CLIENT, FLATLINERS director, who was high on visuals and low on everything else.
There isn’t an aspect of BAD COMPANY that is even a tiny bit original. The film is badly acted, especially by Chris Rock (great comic, horrible thespian); poorly conceived; and about two gunfights too long. Chris Rock plays a street hustler/ticket scalper named Jake, who grew up his whole life in foster care unaware that he has a twin brother. Turns out this twin grew up under much better conditions and became a top agent with the CIA. Jake’s undercover brother is killed as the film opens shortly after he has negotiated the purchase of a suitcase-sized nuclear bomb. The CIA has nine days to come up with a way to make sure the bad guys don’t know Jake’s brother is dead and still make sure the deal happens so the bomb doesn’t get into the wrong hands. I find it odd that two films (this and THE SUM OF ALL FEARS) are coming out within a week of each other with the plot device of a possible nuclear device going off in a major American city. Apparently Hollywood has deemed that Americans are recovered enough now to be threatened with fictional nuclear destruction. But I digress... An embarrassed-looking Anthony Hopkins is on hand to give Jake the training he needs to pass for his sophisticated and worldly dead brother.
There are one or two fun car chases in BAD COMPANY and a seemingly endless string of very dull gun fights, but other than that this movie sucks, throws it back up, and sucks some more. The film is a classic “groaner.” In other words, every time these supposedly intelligent characters do something that no right-thinking human would ever do, you groan. There’s a scene where one of the bad guys betrays his evil boss (overplayed by the normally fun Peter Stormare) in front of Hopkins and Rock. Hopkins actually says out loud to Rock, “Look, he’s double-crossing him.” (or something like that). Naturally, the writers of BAD COMPANY saddle Rock with a girlfriend whom he cares more about saving than all of New York City when the baddies plant the bomb in Grand Central Station. “Groan!!!” And he calls her when he’s supposed to be in hiding, which we know will lead the villains right back to him. “GROAN!!!” And I lost count of how many times during Rock’s training does Hopkins go to his superior officer to say, “He won’t be ready in time.” “F@*#ing GROAN!!!”
If what we’ve been hearing lately about the CIA is true, maybe the Agency is staffed entirely by loonies, but somehow I doubt it. Much like real-life bad company, this film overstays its welcome and bores the crap out of you.
Capone
