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U.S. Marshals
*
Cinema
Releases - April 24,
1998
Rated on a 4-star
scale. USA. Directed by Stuart Baird. Written by John Pogue; based on characters
created by Roy Huggins. Starring Tommy Lee Jones, Wesley Snipes, Robert Downey
Jr., Joe Pantoliano, Kate Nelligan, Irene Jacob, Daniel Roebuck, Tom
Wood.
"U.S. Marshals" is one rare movie
-- a big-budget action flick where the action is worse than the plot. It's
a spin-off of Andrew Davis's masterful 1993 film "The Fugitive", using the
character that won Tommy Lee Jones an Oscar, U.S. Marshal Sam
Gerard.
That character is not the only thing that this
movie steals from "The Fugitive". Despite the insistence by the filmmakers
that it is not a sequel, it follows the rules of one, in that it uses exactly
the same structure as the first film: Innocent man goes on the run. Jones
chases after him. He finds a little hiding-hole while Jones's agents frantically
search for him. He begins to figure out who set him up. Jones realises he's
innocent, but carries on after him anyway. Jones's crew locate him, and bust
in on him just as he's about to blow open the startling twist. He goes on
the run again. There are chases and gunfights. The guilty parties are dealt
with, the fugitive turns himself in, and is exonerated.
This is hardly an original structure, but "The
Fugitive" knew how to use it properly. Its action was exciting, and most
of it was plausible. The particulars of the plot drew us in, and their tying
together in the final reels was clever. The villain may have been a slimy
creep, but he was still interesting, and his being the villain made sense.
The film was technically awesome, and sizzled on the screen. The witty dialogue
worked, as did the chemistry between the groups of actors. The individual
performances of Jones, as well as Harrison Ford as the fugitive, were gripping
and convincing. And there were cute references to the original TV
show.
"U.S. Marshals" opens with Mark Sheridan (Wesley
Snipes) being in a car crash, before being arrested on suspicion of a New
York murder and being flown over there on an aeroplane for prisoners. In
a blink-and-you'll miss it, unbelievably far-fetched action sequence, somebody
somehow blows the entire right side off of the plane by throwing a pen at
someone. Everybody falls out, and the plane crashes in a freezing swamp,
but everybody survives. Nobody thinks of running except for Sheridan, who,
by the indications of the film, is innocent. Then follows the structure I
mentioned.
The action is boring and repetitive, with the
exception of one taut scene in which Snipes jumps onto a train. At one point,
the filmmakers even expect us to be excited about Jones and Robert Downey
Jr. chasing Snipes up some stairs. Although there's an inkling of a good
story somewhere in the middle, an improved version of "Conspiracy Theory"
if you will, it is soon dropped and the screenwriter seems to feel that little
details rather than an actual story will engage the viewer. The villains
are ridiculously laughable, and about as subtle as an episode of "Ironside".
The "witty" dialogue is no such thing, just lame cracks and dead-as-a-doornail
references to the original film that couldn't have even been funny to the
writer, and are just gap-fillers typical of a thousand rejected and incredibly
amateur screenplays. Despite the strong cast, the lines are so bland that
even they can't summon up any interesting chemistry. Jones admirably tries
a few subtle facial expressions, but to no avail. We never get to know the
character of Sheridan, who is also poorly written, and behaves like a maniac,
holding up bystanders and shooting at people, despite the fact he's supposed
to be an innocent man. His actions are explained later, but that's no excuse
for how irritatingly sloppy this film is in its method.
I have already demonstrated how foolish a viewing
of "U.S. Marshals" would be, and so I shall write no further. I have already
wasted two hours watching this incredibly boring and desperate motion picture,
and life's just too short. In thirty years I shall probably be dead, and
that's only 10,950 days. It shall suffice to say that two hours of The Discovery
Channel would be more interesting than "U.S. Marshals".
Really.
COPYRIGHT©
1998 Ian Waldron-Mantgani
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