Well, that was a bit shit.
It appears that Mark Wahlberg has come home. All the good work done in "The Fighter" was a sixth-sigma event, and he has now returned to his ever-repetitive role of cliche-talking, blue-collar tough guy looking to save the day, usually protecting somebody from something. I obviously didn't expect a world-beater with Contraband, but I figured it might make for a nice action flick, Wahlberg's other movies are usually OK (Four Brother's comes to mind, in case y'all forgot!) and it features Ben Foster, who I quite like, to boot.
Unfortunately bad acting and bad writing cannot be overlooked all of the time. The excitement was there (though really not that much) but some of the stuff in this film is just laughable. Right from the very beginning I could tell that this movie was going to offer up a decent helping of cringe-worthy acting and writing. Cliched lines really stick in my craw, and hearing them delivered from Wahlberg and Kate Beckinsale (who I have never thought much of) makes it even worse. Giovanni Ribisi's character was so badly portrayed that you wonder if it was done intentionally as a joke. Ben Foster is still pretty fun to watch, I wish he would stick to a higher calling. This, along with the Jason Statham classic "The Mechanic" really aren't very good mediums for his acting skills. So take the school-boy acting and poor writing and wrap that all together with an incredibly dumb story-line. I mean, it just didn't make a bar of sense. Mark Wahlberg is forced back into his prior life of smuggling in order to pay off his brother-in-law's debt. That sound's simple enough, but, as it is portrayed in the movie, this whole conundrum looks like it could have been solved in about five minutes. Of course that couldn't happen because you need to get an hour and 45 minutes out of it. As the movie progresses (if you want to use the term "progress") plot holes begin to develop, and you soon forget what the hell is really going on. I hope whoever was involved in writing the script and lines for the characters were dragged out into the street and shot.
Yeah, there is some decent action in the movie, including a street shoot-out in Panama City. Actually, scratch that, that was about the only action scene I really liked. I will say for the film that the ending is kind of neat. Well, its a bit of a mix. Wahlberg's character uses some pretty crafty tricks to solve his situation, that was the cool part, but at the same time some horribly implausible stuff takes place that just makes you shake your head.
So, those involved didn't make a complete hash of the latter part of the film, but is it really worth sitting through the whole thing? I almost shut this one off 20 minutes in because I thought it might make me dumber. So....no.
Verdict: Don't bother. Grade: D
If you liked this movie you might also like: Outside of "The Fighter" and that movie he made about the Philadelphia Eagles or whatever, Mark Wahlberg's movies are basically cut from the same cloth.
It appears that Mark Wahlberg has come home. All the good work done in "The Fighter" was a sixth-sigma event, and he has now returned to his ever-repetitive role of cliche-talking, blue-collar tough guy looking to save the day, usually protecting somebody from something. I obviously didn't expect a world-beater with Contraband, but I figured it might make for a nice action flick, Wahlberg's other movies are usually OK (Four Brother's comes to mind, in case y'all forgot!) and it features Ben Foster, who I quite like, to boot.
Unfortunately bad acting and bad writing cannot be overlooked all of the time. The excitement was there (though really not that much) but some of the stuff in this film is just laughable. Right from the very beginning I could tell that this movie was going to offer up a decent helping of cringe-worthy acting and writing. Cliched lines really stick in my craw, and hearing them delivered from Wahlberg and Kate Beckinsale (who I have never thought much of) makes it even worse. Giovanni Ribisi's character was so badly portrayed that you wonder if it was done intentionally as a joke. Ben Foster is still pretty fun to watch, I wish he would stick to a higher calling. This, along with the Jason Statham classic "The Mechanic" really aren't very good mediums for his acting skills. So take the school-boy acting and poor writing and wrap that all together with an incredibly dumb story-line. I mean, it just didn't make a bar of sense. Mark Wahlberg is forced back into his prior life of smuggling in order to pay off his brother-in-law's debt. That sound's simple enough, but, as it is portrayed in the movie, this whole conundrum looks like it could have been solved in about five minutes. Of course that couldn't happen because you need to get an hour and 45 minutes out of it. As the movie progresses (if you want to use the term "progress") plot holes begin to develop, and you soon forget what the hell is really going on. I hope whoever was involved in writing the script and lines for the characters were dragged out into the street and shot.
Yeah, there is some decent action in the movie, including a street shoot-out in Panama City. Actually, scratch that, that was about the only action scene I really liked. I will say for the film that the ending is kind of neat. Well, its a bit of a mix. Wahlberg's character uses some pretty crafty tricks to solve his situation, that was the cool part, but at the same time some horribly implausible stuff takes place that just makes you shake your head.
So, those involved didn't make a complete hash of the latter part of the film, but is it really worth sitting through the whole thing? I almost shut this one off 20 minutes in because I thought it might make me dumber. So....no.
Verdict: Don't bother. Grade: D
If you liked this movie you might also like: Outside of "The Fighter" and that movie he made about the Philadelphia Eagles or whatever, Mark Wahlberg's movies are basically cut from the same cloth.
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