Wednesday, 4 February 1998

RANTING & RAVING
Readers often ask why movies don't work. Particularly movies that have all the right elements. Stars we like. Ideas we like. Style. These films are incredibly infuriating because they come so close to being the moviegoing experiences we crave. Almost.

If there were ever a perfect example of this, it's The Replacement Killers. Chow Yun-Fat is one of the great Hong Kong stars and a great guy on and off screen. Mira Sorvino is an Oscar-winner taking a chance, changing her looks and voice to fit the film. First-time feature director Antoine Fuqua has visual skills to spare. The supporting cast is a cornucopia of good actors from every country on the map. And the story is interesting.

So what went wrong?

Well, start with a screenplay by Ken Sanzel that imitates Hong Kong, but utterly misses the point. The humor that makes those films wonderful is symbolic irony. Arnold-esque tag lines don't belong in this film, yet they reign. Worse, they aren't funny. He even puts one in Chow's mouth. Argh. When Mira tries to sell one line that doesn't get a laugh, the silence is deafening.

Then there's Fuqua. God, this guy is talented. But he may be the next Tony Scott, a visualist who throws away story for style every time he has a chance and occasionally gets saved by a great script. His theft of moments from other films is rampant. The worst is when he plagiarizes the brilliant Danny Trejo death scene from Heat while Trejo himself is in the movie. And he suffers a bad case of my ultimate action pet peeve -- space-itis. We have no idea where the players in fight scenes are. There's no tension if you can't anticipate the danger.

Which brings up an odd element of this film. It's under the hour and a half mark that serves as the bare minimum length for a studio film. You can be sure that it wasn't meant to be that short when they started production. My guess is that there were a lot of studio-requested post-test screening cuts, perhaps of entire scenes. This would also explain why many pretty, but meaningless shots we see early in the film are excessively long.

Here's my solution: Bring back this cast and crew, but get Mira's boyfriend Quentin to write the film. Fuqua has the visual style that QT lacks and Tarantino makes sure that every line of dialogue builds character and moves the story. Exactly what's missing in Killers. Fuqua would have to respect the script enough not to dump thoughts for visuals. Sorvino would have a chance to relax a little and just act. The really bad guys would be wittier. And Chow Yun-Fat would become the American star he deserves to be.

READER OF THE DAY: "How about 'Don't Go Postal?' Several things come to mind. Think about it ..." -- Stephen G

GOING POSTAL: Thought about it, Stephen. What do the rest of you think? Your e-mail is the only way to let me know. And for those of you who like to play at home, the time to get me your box office predictions is now