Hey, audience–are you confused or not sure what is happening? No worries–we will tell you what is going to happen, drop hints all throughout and spoon feed you all the plot points. And you will love it! Wink…Wink! Contraband is that in a nutshell. This a movie that spells it out. Walks you through each scene and leaves nothing to your imagination. It is full of stereotypes and clichés. And it is a shame really–a waste of some serious talent.
Mark Wahlberg is on autopilot for this one and although he is surrounded by strong actors–Kate Beckinsale, Giovanni Ribisi, Ben Foster (one of my favorites), J.K. Simmons–they all come across flat.
One the surface you can say it is a simple, effective heist thriller, but for me it was a bland and predictable. If you’re really interested, you can go see for yourself–who knows? You may disagree with me.
There’s not a lot to think about while watching it and we’ve seen some of this plot before in other films, but for a movie opening in January, it’s actually pretty damn good thanks to a couple of cool heists and a relatively good cast. Nice review.
You are correct about not having to think–and sometimes that can be fun, but this time it was all bit too obvious for me. Also, I refuse to start using the excuse of being released in January as a justification for lazy writing and mediocore filmmaking. We can do better Hollywood–anytime of the year! 🙂
Nice review you have confirmend all my fears about this film. Did you see how Wahlberg claimed he would have prevented 9/11 in a recent Men’s Journal article.