Thursday, September 10, 2015

3 Short Paragraphs: Getaway

2013, Courtney Solomon (Dungeons & Dragons) -- Netflix

In 13 years, this poor guy has directed 3 movies including the reviled D&D movie. But he has a ton of producer credits, so I guess he sticks to his strengths. Dungeons & Dragons was not Asylum level bad but it was not a very good movie and, well, neither is this one. Honestly, the only reason I was attracted to it was Ethan Hawke, and the plot kind of reminded me of Drive, the short lived series starring Nathan Fillion, i.e. guy's wife is kidnapped and he is forced to drive fast or never get her back.

So, yeah, a guy's wife is kidnapped so he has to drive fast fast fast in order to get her back. But here's the twist, the car is stolen, modded with webcams and The Internet (!!!) and the car's original owner, spoiled brat Selena Gomez still looking no more than 14 but all streeted up in ballcap and hoodie, finds the car and jumps in to steal it back. The Voice, John Voight with bad teeth and an even worse Eastern European accent, is the bad guy forcing Ethan (and Selena once she jumps in) to do the driving, watching & controlling events through the car's mods. This all takes place in a nameless (or I plain forgot) European city, so the real demographic is the same audience that Uwe Boll made use of, the resell market over there.

Not only does the movie not make much sense, not convince us Selena is a tech wiz who can hackety hack her car and the city, but it has some unbelievably glaring errors. Almost immediately after Selena gets stuck in the car, Ethan tosses her cell phone out the window so she won't call the cops, another appears in her hands. It reappears and becomes integral to the plot. She didn't have a second and they could have just edited that scene out, but no, and Solomon probably just didn't care enough. The rest of the movie is supposed to be fast driving but the city is so crowded and cobblestone streeted, he spends most of the time shifting. It wanted to be Bourne Meets Furious Vin Diesel but ended up kind of boring and frustrating.

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