There are some actors and actresses out there who are perfectly versatile in their talents,going from drama to comedy to action movie based on a video game with all of the ease of a world renowned trapeze artist,and then there are those who are only at their best in genre fare.
Keanu Reeves is the latter,and nine times out of ten,his stiff style of acting works well in story lines that involve sci-fi kung fu fighting(The Matrix series),run-ins with the devil(Constantine,Devil's Advocate)or pumped up action flicks(Speed,Point Break). It's that tenth time that gets Keanu into trouble and some really bad films.
A prime example of that is Johnny Mnemonic,based on the works of cyberpunk writer Willian Gibson,where Keanu plays the title character whose job it is in his futuristic world to have corporate computer data downloaded into his brain(insert joke about plenty of space for that in his head here) for secretive courier service.
Johnny's newest batch of software threatens to cause a permanent mental meltdown,so he seeks a cure with the help of a bodyguard gal for hire(Dina Meyer)before the Yakuza hunt him down to chop off his head. Sounds like a bad video game,doesn't it,folks? Johnny does get a tad testy after awhile,very much like a teenager that can't get his Sidekick to text message properly:
A whole array of oddly cast folk are after Johnny's brainpan info,including a self proclaimed Street Preacher(Dolph Lundgren),a group of rebels called LoTeks lead by J-Bone(Ice T) and a discredited doctor(Henry Rollins)who runs an underground clinic for those afflicted with the latest incurable disease,said ailment having a super secret remedy that just happens to be trapped in our boy's "Just Johnny" head. As the Church Lady would say, how convenient!:
Is Johnny moved to help stop the sufferings of others? Hell to the no on that one,folks. All he wants is to get back those yuppie creature comforts that he feels entitled to and at one point makes a speech about his trials and tribulations that would make Shakespeare weep,if that would get Johnny to quit whining:
In the end,Johnny Mnemonic is a cinematic virus riddled with a hodgepodge of a plot and compulsive overacting. Much of the blame for this mess of a movie went to studio for chopping it up in the editing room(there's a director's cut that was released in Japan) but even with a couple of extra scenes tossed in,this is one sci-fi book to film that is truly lost in translation.
I actually paid good money to see Johnny Mnemonic when it came out in theaters back in 1995(my sister wanted to go,so she endured this onscreen cyber sludge with me)and even thinking about now,I still want my money back.
That's as likely to happen as finding a pot of gold on my doorstep but at least one good thing came out of my having to watch this tripe; a good enough bad film to wrap up Bad Movie Month just right. Thanks for attending BMM 2009,folks and if you have suggestions for 2010,feel free to let me know. I'll save you some aisle seats:
1 comment:
Keanu Reeves has some good films but it's stuff like this that totally validate those 'one expression only' jokes. Very odd and it seems very, very worthy to be on the BMM list.
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