New on DVD Nov 24 2008 @ 09:00 pm
REVIEW: Hancock
Directed By: Peter Berg
Written By: Vincent Ngo & Vince Gilligan
Starring: Will Smith, Jason Bateman, Charlize Theron
Running Time: 92 minutes
Rated PG-13 for some intense sequences of sci-fi action and violence, and language
This review was originally written on July 2, 2008.
I love Peter Berg, much much more than I reasonably should. He’s directed some entertaining (if slightly forgettable) movies like Friday Night Lights and The Kingdom, but he holds a special place in my heart for putting one of the greatest action epics of all time onto film. That’s right, you guessed it, The Rundown, starring Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and Seann William Scott (you know, Stifler from American Pie).
You probably think I’m being sarcastic. I’m not. For inexplicable reasons, The Rundown is one of my all-time favorites, sharing a spot in my Top 10 along with Vertigo, Lawrence of Arabia, and Requiem for a Dream (I am nothing if not eclectic). I love this film with a passion that borders on the unhealthy, and my wife becomes intensely irritated with me whenever I want to watch it for the 37th time. It’s a mania that rises to teenage-girl-meets-Titanic levels of obsession, and whenever I meet one of the uninitiated, a rabid glee enters my eyes as I preach on its Looney Tunes-esque action sequences, its Arnold Schwarzenegger cameo, and Christopher Walken uttering my favorite line of dialogue ever, “Wow, that’s a lot of cows.” Professional propriety can shove it–I love this film.
So you can imagine the lightheaded anticipation I’ve felt ever since witnessing that first Hancock trailer back in January. Not only was it riotously funny, Peter “The Rundown” Berg (!) was at the helm, and maybe, just maybe, another guilty pleasure masterpiece would muscle its way into my Top 10.
Sadly, it wasn’t to be. Even though the cynic within me took a backseat to the giddy fanboy, Hancock left me more conscious of its flaws than of its successes, and although it has moments of genuine popcorn gobbling fun, it ultimately buckles under the weight of its own ambition.
Hancock reasons with the locals.
Will Smith (I Am Legend) plays the titular ‘hero,’ a grimy bum who would rather sleep off his hangover on a city bench than save the day from L.A.’s various do-badders. The opening sequence finds him reluctantly stepping in to stop a high speed pursuit on the 105 Freeway (his ‘call to action’ is a small boy with a colorful vocabulary). He cartwheels through the air like a drunken Superman, which makes sense since he is drunk, casually destroying property with all the finesse of an inebriated 3-legged bull in a china shop. He lands in the back of the perpetrators’ SUV and tries to calmly reason with them and their Uzis, until they rat-a-tat-tat his favorite pair of shades and trusty bottle of Jim Beam, at which point he gets slightly peeved and proceeds to spike their vehicle, with them in it, on top of a nearby skyscraper. A local newscaster informs us that the property damage has climbed to $9 million, a “personal best” for Hancock, and wishes that he would go save New York instead. Thus we are introduced to our antihero, a lazy, foul-mouthed, unloved strongman in desperate need of a PR makeover.
Will Smith as Hancock and Jason Bateman as Ray Embrey.
The first two thirds of the film are sheer genre fun and almost worth the price of admission. While not groundbreaking, the premise is certainly clever, and the script mines the gimmick for all it’s worth. A few of the gags are painfully unfunny (one in particular brings new, unpleasant meaning to the term ‘brown noser’), but most of them pulled the guffaws out of me in spite of my better judgment. Hancock chucks obese bullies thousands of feet in the air, “rescues” beached whales, and argues with the locals over whether he should have flipped the car or gone straight up into the air with it. Jason Bateman (oh Michael Bluth, your Arrested Development fans miss you) plays the PR exec with a heart of gold who takes Hancock under his wing and sets him on the road to recovery, redemption, and civil responsibility. And, as schmaltzy as that sounds, the film (accompanied by Will Smith’s respectable acting chops) deftly earns Hancock’s transformation from a**hole to role model. The transition would have been ripe for melodrama, but Berg navigates the emotionally gooey minefields of AA meetings and adorable kids who “believe in him” with a sure hand, and I never once had trouble believing that Hancock was becoming a better human being.
Then, just when the film has charmed its way into your good graces, it whips out a 3rd act revelation that resembles more of a kick to the crown jewels than a shockingly clever twist (which they no doubt thought they had achieved). Ribald-superhero-comedy-with-a-surprisingly-tender-heart meet epic-Shakespearean-romantic-tragedy-chock-full-of-confusing-Lady in the Waterish-mythology. Wait, what? To discuss it any further would be to potentially ruin the surprise (as bizarre as it may be), but suffice to say Berg and his scripters make a fatal miscalculation that shipwrecks an otherwise wonderful flick.
Hancock and PETA are BFF.
Humor me an anecdote. My cafeteria in college was overseen by a company with dubious culinary credentials. Mystery meats made regular appearances, and the one bright spot in the week was Mexican day, since you have to work pretty hard to screw up tacos and beans. Sitting down to lunch between bouts of Abstract Algebra and Glee Club, I coated my tortilla in sour cream and opened up for a mammoth bite of Tex-Mex goodness…and nearly threw up as my mouth was assaulted with a disgustingly foreign flavor. Cleansing my palate out with some generic blue soda, I realized that the ever-vigilant cafeteria staff had mistakenly placed cream cheese into the sour cream bin.
Now, I love cream cheese almost as much as I love sour cream, but when I’m promised one and given the other instead, the effect is shockingly unpleasant. Neither of Hancock’s films (and there are two distinctly different motion pictures wrestling one another within it) are necessarily bad, but when you’ve been savoring and enjoying one, only to have it secretly switched on you halfway through, it’s like being served a bagel topped with sour cream.
With a little more work in the script stage, Hancock could have been the surprise gem of the summer, destined for loving cult status, rather than the forgettable box office flash-in-the-pan it’s sure to become. You’ve let me down a bit, Peter Berg, but we can still be pals, and if I’m not mistaken I think I hear The Rundown calling to me from the other room. In movies, as in life, there’s nothing a little Christopher Walken can’t fix.
on Jul 02 2008 @ 3:00 pm 1. Phillip Johnston said …
I guess I’m finally going to have to watch The Rundown.
on Jul 02 2008 @ 5:02 pm 2. Evan Derrick said …
Yeah, watch it and LOVE IT. That’s a command. Or else.
on Jul 02 2008 @ 6:10 pm 3. G said …
You thought there were only two films? I said 3 or 4 in my review, and I thought I was being generous. It was basically a series of 15 minute short films.
This was my first Peter Berg film…
on Jul 02 2008 @ 8:43 pm 4. Nathan said …
I have little doubt that your reviews hope to generate discussion on the film in question, but as I apparently do not have the ability to see anything more than 1 theatrical release per year (god bless my lovely ankle biter!), I have to ask the obvious question:
The Rundown? Seriously? A diamond in the rough?
That sounds so crazy I have to go out and watch this movie right now.
Btw, I’m quite the Peter Berg fan myself, but because I’ve seen The Kingdom 12 times and I’m the only person in all of Oklahoma that didn’t hyperventilate while watching Lions for Lambs (which I know he only had a minor part in, but still).
Plus: who could forget gems like Fire in the Sky?
Ooo, and I see he’s directing Dune (scheduled: 2010). I’m way too much of a geek to pass that up. I’ve read every Dune book ever written (including the atrocities that are Frank Jr.’s handiwork).
Another good review that was entertaining, thanks buddy.
Nathan
p.s. What would it take to get a preview button on this whole submit form? I always feel like I should yell “fire in the hole!” before I hit submit, then peek through my fingers to see what actually ended up with my name attached to it.
on Jul 03 2008 @ 12:10 am 5. Rick Olson said …
I liked Berg’s “Friday Night Lights”; looks like I’ll have to track down “The Rundown” now. Thanks a lot, guy.
on Jul 03 2008 @ 6:23 am 6. Evan Derrick said …
Just so all of you people who are going to watch The Rundown on account of me know, expect a fun, airy film filled with amazing stuntwork. It truly is one of my favorite films of all time, but I say that recognizing that it really isn’t a great film at all.
I’ll just sit here and wait for you to come back and throw stones at me.
on Jul 03 2008 @ 6:26 am 7. Evan Derrick said …
Oh, and Nathan, who could forget Fire in the Sky? And as to the preview button, yeah, I’d like to implement some more features like that in the future…I just need some free time, what with my 2 ankle biters and all.
on Jul 03 2008 @ 7:59 am 8. Luke Harrington said …
You know, I have a brother who once accidentally put sour cream in his hot chocolate at an Old Country Buffet (thinking it was whipped cream, of course). Then he proceeded to drink the whole thing, gagging all the way, because he hates to waste food.
Maybe I should recommend Hancock to him…
on Jul 03 2008 @ 9:41 am 9. Fletch said …
It’s not close to being one of my top 10, but I’ll vouch for The Rundown being a fun, well-made action flick that harkens back to the glory days of the 80s actioners. It’s easily the best action movie Johnson has been involved with that I’ve seen (I haven’t seen Walking Tall, but I’ll assume The Rundown is better).
Still, I heart Berg for nothing more than Aspen Extreme, or as I like to call it, Top Gun on the ski slopes. That movie belongs in the Awesomely Bad Movie Hall of Fame. I’ve always preferred Berg as an actor than a director.
on Jul 03 2008 @ 11:22 am 10. Evan Derrick said …
Ah Fletch, I am indebted. And yes, it is way better than Walking Tall. I will have to check out the awesomeness that is Aspen Extreme sometime. Sounds like the perfect Saturday afternoon time waster.
on Jul 03 2008 @ 9:12 pm 11. Cinexcellence said …
Well Evan, it was because of your glowing review that I watched Speed Racer. So with that in mind, I guess I’ll have to give The Rundown a looksie.
on Jul 08 2008 @ 8:59 am 12. Maurice said …
Super heroes are a selfish lot. Think about it. What do they really do for the common man? How does a superman really benefit our kind? Oh sure, they occasionally save us from a giant, alien starfish and they can be called upon to stop a magnetic mutant from stealing my paper clips or hubcabs. But that does not put gass in my car. I feel no sincerity from them. Expect for Batman.
Batman let’s you know he’s self-centered. He bounds around, stomping the fingers of criminals in HIS city and back-handing Poison Ivy every time she tries to germinate a monster from a tulip bulb. So what. Batman cares about you and me about as much as Streisand does when she warns us to stay out of Colorado but his contempt is obvious. You want to fight help him fight crime? Stay the hell outta Gotham, touristas!
Ever pondered how these muties suddenly possess these powers with little effort. Some of them can fly but none are afraid of heights. Some are strong enough to rip a tank in half but are able to easily get a Ritz cracker out of the package with no breakage. They can even give Betty a shoulder rub without dislocating anything important, like, say, her pesky spinal column. Some have eyebeams (seeing red), some can change shape (wearing red), some can create a tornado with their lower extremities (is red) and some can swim and talk to fish (pansy). But how does that benefit the little guy?
I always thought that once, just once, I’d like to see one of these guys that would develop superpowers and be pissed off. He’d laze around with an attitude of screw you and a t-shirt that read “Free Mustache Rides” and he’d give bad guys a wash by wizzing on them. In fact, he’d be a borderline bully, grumpy all the time and doing what ever he wanted. He’d get your cat out of the tree and then use the beast for a quick Ray Guy imitation, using the Twin Towers as goal posts. His surliness would be his costume and he would never need a surfboard to fly around on. He’d be Hancock.
While this may not be a great film, it’s a great concept: The hero who has no idea who he is. I know it’s a good concept because I thought it up 20 years ago at a bar one night. We (cops) had finished a shift and over chicken wings and beer, I brought this idea to the forefront and have ran with it ever since. By the way, I also created the idea of the Borg’s Cube ships at a Star Trek convention 30 years ago but I didn’t get credit for that either. Never ask a Roddenberry why starships aren’t square and expect compensation later when he steals the concept. Hancock is a great concept. Will Smith is not.
Will Smith is rapidly becoming the Wolverine of filmdom. Wolverine is Marvel comics go-to guy when a series is boring or in danger of cancellation. I’ve seen the little Canuck in more titles than I have seen smooshed out roaches in the ashtrays of a ’69 VW microbus with a Steal-Your-Face air freshener. It’s not that he makes the title book better or more interesting; it makes comic geeks buy one more issue. It’s always about the bottom line, isn’t it?
This film fell apart right about the time Hancock “sneezed” and for those who have yet to see it, that’s a code word you should remember for this to make sense. He sneezes and the film falls in the crapper and no one really cared because Will-verine’s in the film. Let’s wreck something, more mayhem, bash more props, add some tear getting pathos and viola! A complete film. Well, heck, that’s just like “I Am Legend.” Hey, that also sounds like “Independence Day” and also “Men In Black II.” Wait, he’s not Wolverine. He’s that pesky voice actor guy from the Pixar films who get’s speaking roles because he’s buddy’s with Doris at the studio’s coffee shop and she’s the bosses widowed Mom.
Go see “Hancock.” It’s not all bad and you’ll be able to enjoy the good parts. In fact, the whole gag with the jar lid was funny in its context. As a bonus, you get a handy guide to all of the variations and uses for the word “ass” and even I, a seasoned veteran, never knew that there were so many possibilities for its use. Thanks, Hollywood. You’ve made a lesser man of me.
I “heart” your reviews. Thanks for a great web site.
on Jul 08 2008 @ 8:53 pm 13. James said …
Aloha,
Wow. Maurice, you are one tough act to follow…
You killed pretty much whatever I had to say about this movie…
I’ll go and sit in my corner now. Where’s my dunce cap?
Mahalo,
James
on Jul 09 2008 @ 4:22 pm 14. Evan Derrick said …
Thanks for another grand comment, Maurice. One of Will Smith’s greatest assets–his innate likeability–is also one of his greatest hindrances. Because he is so likeable, and because American audiences of all sizes, shapes, colors, and flavors can relate to him, the films he is in trend towards the generic. It’s as if the studio heads are saying, “Hey, we’ve got Will Smith in this, everyone likes him, we’re going to make a ton of money, so lets toss out that nasty un-friendly ending we have and secure even more box office booty.” So even when you have concepts as risky as I Am Legend and Hancock, they end up getting neutered and dumbed down along the way. It’s all about the bottom line, isn’t it? Will Smith needs to get out there and earn him some indie cred. Take a $100,000 paycheck instead of a $10,000,000 paycheck and star in something that will actually test his acting chops.
on Jul 12 2008 @ 4:52 pm 15. Thadd Harrington said …
Evan, you Rock (Johnson). I thought I’d never find another person who loves The Rundown as much as I do.
on Jul 12 2008 @ 6:18 pm 16. Evan Derrick said …
Thadd, your cinephile cred has gone up 10 fold now. We true believers need to stick together; we’re far and few between.
“A little thunder…a little lightning…”