A fantastic study in Yank characters as written and directed by Brits:
First, you have Tom Cruise's callow, selfish flak. He arrives with no sense of history or place, immediately starts telling everyone else what to do, and panics when this goes poorly for him.
Second, Charlotte Riley's Nance, an exercise in taking a breathtakingly beautiful woman and covering her with enough grime makeup, ragged vests and some kind of Southern mutant accent to convince a viewer that her entire…
Answers the question" "What if Jack Nicholson was the good guy in A Few Good Men?"
Denzel may be old.
Denzel may be tired.
But Denzel is still Denzel.
This outing does mess with the primary draw of the series: watching the most accomplished actor of our age dismantle evil men with brutal efficiency. Rather than flesh out the runtime with sidequests of Mccall cleaning up the struggles of those in his vicinity, we follow him in a weakened and vulnerable state, initially struggling and then learning to appreciate receiving care from those around him. It's…
This movie could be used as evidence for a legal restriction on the number of flashbacks allowed per movie. This number would be halved for any first-time filmmaker.
The only thing that keeps the film from being complete trash is the cast, who do their best with the narrative provided. If Tertiary Whedon hadn't chopped the emotional beats into confetti with cuts between the present and past, there probably was a competent budget thriller somewhere in the pieces.
