C | A rogue bomber pilot steals two nukes. Directed by John Woo Starring John Travolta, Christian Slater, and Samantha Mathis Review by Jon Kissel |
The action movies that dominated the mid-90’s occupy an interesting place in the culture. The Cold War’s over, so Communist villains are out, but it’s pre-9/11, so the next easy bad-guy shorthand hasn’t arrived yet, either. Hollywood’s still reveling in leftover masculinity from the 80’s, so there’s none of the introspection of something like the Bourne series. We’re all gung-ho with nowhere to go, so these movies frequently envision internal chaotic enemies i.e. your Castor Troys, your Cyrus the Viruses. Whatever it takes to keep the Department of Defense-sponsored glorification of war games going. Broken Arrow is an early example of the six-year period that would be dominated by Jerry Bruckheimer and his protégé Michael Bay, and no one would say it’s the best of breed. Hong Kong action staple director John Woo still hasn’t figured out how to marry his distinctive style to English-language film, a synchronization he would finally crack one year later with Face/Off. These absurd movies need to get as far from realism as possible, and Broken Arrow, while it’s no one’s idea of realistic, is still too close. I at least need magnet boots or their equivalent in my nonsense action.
Woo puts together a strong core group for Broken Arrow but this is a film without much, if any, unique flair. Christian Slater is a more credible action star than his more-famous co-lead (more on him later). Samantha Mathis’ park ranger has more to do than the average token female in these kinds of movies. Graham Yost will go on to contribute to TV shows like Band of Brothers and create Justified, but he’s still early in his career at this point and it shows. The plot, in which a rogue bomber pilot gets his hands on a couple nukes, is barely enough for a couple chapters of a Tom Clancy novel, and it’s filled with the kind of stalls that make this genre into a parody of itself. For the action itself, Woo gets in some of his recurring motifs like double pistols and diving behind barriers for cover, but there’s not a dove to be found and if that single moment of double pistols was cut out, the film would be unrecognizable as a Woo creation. Perhaps he needed to build up more independence before he could really let loose, which he does, again, with Face/Off.
At the same time Woo is trying something different, so is antagonist John Travolta as Vic Deakins. Coming off Pulp Fiction and Get Shorty, Travolta had never been in a straight action flick before, nor had he been a villain. Kudos to him for using all of his cred to try something new, though he’s better at one of these skills than the other. Unlike fellow Scientologist Tom Cruise, Travolta isn’t manifesting an onscreen death wish with impossible stunts and you-are-there danger. On the other hand, he’s loving being a bad guy. There’s a feyness and a theatricality to his performance that makes him easy to buy as a psychopath obsessed with dominating every interaction. Anyone who lights a cigarette with a full-finger flourish, even when there’s no one around, wants people to notice him. Woo helps Travolta out with not one, but two slow-motion entrances, and Travolta helps himself out by following up a throat-punch with a pinched read of ‘Hush!,’ though he also directly quotes Pulp Fiction in what I chose to believe is an ill-conceived ad-lib. He’s not doing enough to save the film, but he’s trying stuff compared to the stock performances of Slater and Mathis.
Travolta can’t seriously elevate Broken Arrow because it wastes a lot of time in unnecessary places. The analyst sent from Washington, played by Frank Whaley, is so insignificant that he doesn’t come up in the nine-paragraph Wikipedia summary. The most senior on-the-ground military official, played by Delroy Lindo, is thought of so minimally by the film that he dies off-camera from pilot error, and he’s not even the one doing the flying. Howie Long doesn’t fit into this problem specifically, as he’s always with Deakins, but he bears mention based on the sweet deal he clearly negotiated for himself. Of all the people in the film, Long’s henchman is the only one praised for his acting skills. That could not have been a coincidence.
With only vague memories of seeing Broken Arrow half of my lifetime ago and a general side-eyed appreciation of the time period, I wasn’t expecting this film to be so ordinary. Its greatest sin is how rote so much of it is, essentially Die Hard in a desert. Travolta in his middle-aged prime isn’t enough. C
At the same time Woo is trying something different, so is antagonist John Travolta as Vic Deakins. Coming off Pulp Fiction and Get Shorty, Travolta had never been in a straight action flick before, nor had he been a villain. Kudos to him for using all of his cred to try something new, though he’s better at one of these skills than the other. Unlike fellow Scientologist Tom Cruise, Travolta isn’t manifesting an onscreen death wish with impossible stunts and you-are-there danger. On the other hand, he’s loving being a bad guy. There’s a feyness and a theatricality to his performance that makes him easy to buy as a psychopath obsessed with dominating every interaction. Anyone who lights a cigarette with a full-finger flourish, even when there’s no one around, wants people to notice him. Woo helps Travolta out with not one, but two slow-motion entrances, and Travolta helps himself out by following up a throat-punch with a pinched read of ‘Hush!,’ though he also directly quotes Pulp Fiction in what I chose to believe is an ill-conceived ad-lib. He’s not doing enough to save the film, but he’s trying stuff compared to the stock performances of Slater and Mathis.
Travolta can’t seriously elevate Broken Arrow because it wastes a lot of time in unnecessary places. The analyst sent from Washington, played by Frank Whaley, is so insignificant that he doesn’t come up in the nine-paragraph Wikipedia summary. The most senior on-the-ground military official, played by Delroy Lindo, is thought of so minimally by the film that he dies off-camera from pilot error, and he’s not even the one doing the flying. Howie Long doesn’t fit into this problem specifically, as he’s always with Deakins, but he bears mention based on the sweet deal he clearly negotiated for himself. Of all the people in the film, Long’s henchman is the only one praised for his acting skills. That could not have been a coincidence.
With only vague memories of seeing Broken Arrow half of my lifetime ago and a general side-eyed appreciation of the time period, I wasn’t expecting this film to be so ordinary. Its greatest sin is how rote so much of it is, essentially Die Hard in a desert. Travolta in his middle-aged prime isn’t enough. C
RSS Feed