Alrighty all you non-believers out there, we got John Robie, the world's greatest cat burglar (next to David Niven in THE PINK PANTHER) with our second look at... THE BONE COLLECTOR, the latest from Philip Noyce.... Here's what he has to say about it all...
So I’m sitting in the theater and the hottie boombottie next to me says, “Pinch my breast when you think you’ve figured out the killer.” We were watching The Bone Collector, the new Denzel Washington movie, and as the credits started rolling and I saw the name Michael Rooker I reached over and gave a tug of her left mam. Then I saw the name Queen Latifah, my cleavage heavy most favorite Nubian Princess, and I reached over and tweaked her again. “You already said the killer is going to be Michael Rooker,” she cooed. “Naw…I’m pretty sure now the killer is…oh,” and I reached over and grabber her heaving bosom, but by that time it was the name of the art director and she was onto my game and that was that, but she was still all like’n that shit because I’m a fuckin’ mac. C’mon, this was an L.A. chic. They aren’t that smart. Well, some are…the ones that write in talkbacks, that is. Ya’ dig, my bitches?
Yep, that story is pretty much a metaphor for The Bone Collector. Or is it? Does that make any sense at all? Does the above paragraph sound like complete gibberish, the keyboard patter of a guy playing out his sixth-grade fantasies, the kind of moronic fluff that one would expect from the drop-out pothead working at Cinnabun? Well hooray if it does, because that above paragraph is about on par with the intelligence that went into the crafting of the third act—and especially the ending—of The Bone Collector. Unless they change the thing, unless someone wakes up and realizes the utter stupidity of what’s going on, you all are in for a treat; the most ridiculous, goofy, completely unjustified climax to a thriller in years. It’s really a shame, too, because there’s parts of The Bone Collector that really work well. Yet the ending, oi vey, a stinka it is.
A cop who specializes in forensic pathology gets paralyzed from the neck down, months later a serial killer is lose in the city, a supremely hot beat cop finds the first body, she teams up with the paralyzed cop to find the killer--in the process of which she comes into her own as a forensic pathologist and cultivates a genuine mentor/student relationship with the paralyzed cop. There’s your boring studio breakdown of the film.
The paralyzed cop is played by Denzel Washington, who does a fine job of giving a guy who basically sits in a bed the whole movie a lot of nice little mannerisms. Denzel’s last movie, The Siege, was real good up until the part where the Star Wars trailer ended, and this one sustains interest, even has some decent (though real obvious) thrills. Hell, Denzel is a great actor, he could turn the most vacuously written role to something interesting, and here he does a fine job. Angelina Jolie, lips so huge she could level entire cities with the shockwaves that would surely be emitted if she ever raspberried, does a fine job here as well. Now aside from the fact that she’s just gorgeous—and am I the only one who thinks she looks like an elf—and aside from the fact that a supermodel is playing a NEW YORK CITY BEAT COP she’s really good here. This’ll no doubt convince many that she’s definitely got the stuff to carry a flick. What hurts her is some lame dialogue. “I swear I’m going to nail this son of a bitch” isn’t exactly the most original thing in the world to say when one is in pursuit of a serial killer. “I’m gonna rip off this guy’s hog, nail it to the refrigerator and bite it every day,” might sound a bit better. Then again, that might just be the ramblings of the same kid who wrote that first paragraph.
So the two lead characters in the film are acted fine. They’re a bit wooden at first, but they grow into each other well. But they grow into each other as the STUDENT and the TEACHER. I put that in caps for emphasis since I can’t scream it to anyone concerned with the movie. They most certainly DON’T cultivate a romantic relationship, and again it’s the last five minutes of the movie which royally screws with their relationship in a very “I’m a young studio executive with a cool black leather jacket, I say they should get together” sort of way.
Now the rest of the movie has got some strength. Yeah there’s some lame stuff, with the police
investigations coming off as real, real Hollywood. Yeah some of the characters are weak—Michael
Rooker, who’s a fun actor, is reduced to a stock Mean, Snarling Police Chief. But every dumb thing here
is countered by something fun, a nice turn in a conversation or a neat little image that made me think the
movie might be a little smarter than I’d thought. It’s sure got some gnarly, nasty death/torture sequences.
This one definitely wins the award for the most heinous stuff on screen this year, unless Cher turns up in a
movie in the fall. I kid Cher, she’s a fan and a buddy. Hi Cher! Anyway, yeah, there’s some good freaky
stuff here, and the progression of Jolie from a scared young cop to a tough forensic investigator is actually
pretty good. I was damn impressed with how well Jolie handled herself here in a few scenes. Hell, looked
like some of Papa’s genes rubbed off on her. Though I hope not too many; Papa (Jon Voight) produced
“Baby Geniuses.” Incidentally, if you mess with the poster a bit, you can make
“Baby Geniuses” into
“Baby Penises.”
I’ve strayed, and no doubt lost any credibility as a mature fan of film, so I’ll just get to the problem; the killer and his explanation of “why” is so dumb that my brain would have been no less numbed had I walked out of the theatre, went to the bathroom, and banged my head against the toilet for an hour. I’m not ruining anything here, not giving away any big surprises, but let me just say this; I really don’t think someone would become a psychotic serial killer (as opposed to…) because they got sent to prison for two years. I really don’t think it’s a good idea to have a guy with two little scenes come in at the end as the killer and give an explanation that has no bearing on anything said previously in the movie. I really, really think that this whole deal with the killer, oh gosh people…I really don’t want to spoil stuff, but in the movie…Okay,
SPOILER!!!!! GO READ ABOUT STAR WARS NOW IF YOU DON’T WANT TO KNOW!!!!! ….in the movie the killer comes in at the end and basically says that he’s killing people because Denzel’s character testified against him—he was a doctor—at a trial three years ago, discredited him, and just plain made him angry. “I got angry, soooooo….I became a serial killer.” Huh? I’m wondering if this reads as silly as it was in the movie. Queen Latifa, who I think is really good in a really small role in the movie, bites it in a very Scream way. It’s so completely lame. This isn’t the worst thing about the ending, though; after, of course, Angelina Jolie comes in at the last second and blows away the bad guy, there’s a friggin’ Christmas party with Denzel all happy in a wheel chair, very obviously in a relationship with Jolie, and screaming about how it’s time to “Paaaarrrttyyyy!” Huh? Wha…wha’ happened? Am I in the same movie? What nitwit thought this scene was a good idea? “Oh, no, see, it’s to show you that things are all better.” No no no, it’s to show me that you’re a moron. Please get rid of this scene. END OF SPOILERS!!!!!
So basically you’ve got a decent thriller that could, with a reworked last-half-of-third act/climax, really bill itself as a good flick. Will it get fixed? Probably not. So in a few months you’ll get a blitzkrieg marketing campaign, a fast paced trailer, a few quotes from “critics” telling you how tense and exciting The Bone Collector is, you’ll go see it and, once that climax hits, the whole theater will stand in unison and scream, through uncontrollable fits of laughter, “What the hell was THAT?”
