Posts Tagged ‘Scott Mann’

FALL: 3 STARS. “a simple film that delivers the vertigo inducing goods.”

If the name “Vertigo” wasn’t already taken by a classic movie, it could very well have been the title of the new fear-of-heights thriller “Fall,” now playing in theatres. Mostly set on a tiny platform high above the earth, it is a dizzying experience.

“Fall” begins with thrill seekers Becky (Grace Fulton) and husband Dan (Mason Gooding) clinging to the side of a mountain. When tragedy strikes, Becky is left alone and traumatized. Off the mountain she lives in fear, and her father (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) is convinced she is medicating herself with alcohol.

Her adrenaline junkie friend Hunter (Virginia Gardner) thinks Becky needs to get back up on the horse, put fear aside and pay tribute to Dan by climbing an abandoned 2000-foot radio tower in the middle of nowhere. They’ll scale the structure, spread his ashes and bring closure to Becky’s suffering.

The expert climbers scale the tower with the aid of a rickety old ladder, which falls apart as they rise. At the top, they perch on a small platform, but their elation is fleeting. With the ladder in pieces, getting down to ground level is going to test not only their skills as mountaineers, but the bond of their friendship.

The pleasure of “Fall,” I suppose, is voyeuristic. We can watch Becky and Hunter try and figure their way back to safety, while not actually being nibbled on by vultures ourselves. It’s a relief. We’re glad we’re not them, and that gives us the thrill, the dopamine rush we want, as we remain safe in an earthbound theatre.

Like “Open Water,” “47 Meters Down” or “27 Hours,” and other endurance dramas that place a person or persons in untenable situations of their own making, “Fall” is a cautionary tale. The old saying may be that, “the biggest risk is taking no risk at all,” but that, I think, applies more to the stock market than it does to climbing 2000-foot poles in the middle of nowhere. Becky and Hunter take unnecessary risks to make themselves feel alive and, whoops, end up endangering their own lives.

It’s hard to conjure up a great deal of sympathy for their ridiculous situation, particularly since neither are particularly well-rounded characters, but nonetheless “Fall” is a visceral experience. It’s a mix-and-match of hopelessness, frustration and resilience, captured, despite some dodgy CGI, with some impressive high-flying photography by director Scott Mann and cinematographer MacGregor.

“Fall” is a simple film with a simple premise. It lags in the middle and overstays its welcome by fifteen or twenty minutes, but as a story of survival against insurmountable odds it delivers the vertigo inducing goods.

HEIST: 1 STAR. “a generic title to match its characters and direct-to-video feel.”

I could write a nostalgic piece about how, once upon a time in a far away time and place, Robert de Niro’s name on a marquee was a sign of quality. Or I could write a snarky article about paycheque movies and taking roles for the cash. Maybe a generic What the heck happened to Robert de Niro? Column would be in order.

Either way, any of those topics could be easily folded into a review of “Heist,” a flaccid new crime drama that adds nothing to Mr. De Niro’s legacy except, perhaps, for a dollars in his bank account.

The great thespian plays Mr. Pope— famous as The Pope to all those who know and fear him. For thirty years he’s run The Swan Casino with an iron fist. No compromises. Bottom line, if you steal from him you die. Ten dollars to ten million dollars, the consequences are the same. “Nobody steals from The Swan not because it’s Fort Knox but because everyone is afraid of The Pope,” says Vaughn (Jeffrey Dean Morgan), but that doesn’t stop him from coordinating a robbery that will net him and his co-conspirators Cox (Dave Bautista) and Dante (Stephen Cyrus Sepher) three million in cash. Vaughn needs the money to pay for an operation for his daughter and he’s desperate enough to cross The Pope to get the money.

Things go wrong and soon Vaughn, Cox and Dante are on a bus filled with civilians zooming their way to freedom with The Pope’s henchmen (Morris Chestnut) and the police (led by fighter Gina Carano) in hot pursuit.

The first time De Niro starred in a heist movie directed by someone with the last name Mann we got “Heat,” a genuinely exciting action movie. This time around director Scott Mann has cast De Niro in a movie with a generic title to match its characters and direct-to-video feel. Part “Speed” and part every other heist film ever made, “Heist” relies on implausible plot twists—like cops who break the law to aid the bad guys because one of the hijackers had “a reassuring voice”—and clichés to tell its weak-tea story.

One exchange between The Pope and his henchman sums up the entire movie.

“Looks like they’re running to the border!”

“Cliché,” says The Pope.

Yes it is Bob, and so is the rest of the movie.