Review: Lockout (2012)
Cast: Guy Pearce, Maggie Grace, Peter Stormare
Director: James Mather, Stephen St. Leger
Country: France
Genre: Action | Thriller | Sci-Fi
Official Trailer: Here
Of the various lost arts of cinema nowadays, the one that gets brushed aside too often are the B movies. The cheap, fun, “we know this is dumb, just go along with it” kind of film that are often where talent both in front of and behind the camera hone their craft before moving onto bigger and better things. What was once an industry unto itself with the likes of Val Lewton, Roger Corman and New World Pictures have been shoved to the side and demoted to the “direct to DVD” ghetto. But every once in a while (usually during either spring or late August) we get the smaller films that harken back to the B movies of old. Most recently, films like Phone Booth, The Bank Job and A Perfect Getaway that remind us how inventive low budget filmmaking and lowered expectations can sometimes create magic. Lockout, unfortunately, is not one of them.
…every once in a while (usually during either spring or late August) we get the smaller films that harken back to the B movies of old.
The film focuses on Snow (Guy Pearce), a wise-ass CIA operative whose been arrested and wrongfully accused of killing a fellow agent and for espionage against the U.S. He’s offered a pardon if he agrees to be sent up to M.S. One, a maximum security prison in space, to rescue Emilie Warnock (Maggie Grace), the President’s daughter whose been taken hostage by the inmates who’ve escaped. He agrees, if only to potentially get to his partner and to find out where he hid the evidence that could exonerate him. After that, it’s your regular rip-off of John Carpenter’s Escape From New York with bad effects (particularly in the Earth sequences), stock psychos with Scottish accents so thick you have no idea what’s going on, obvious and contrived set ups (especially from what is arguably the worst secret service agent this side of 24) and a sprinkling of snarky fun along the way so that the audience isn’t completely bored by the entire proceedings.
…it’s your regular rip-off of John Carpenter’s Escape From New York with bad effects (particularly in the Earth sequences), stock psychos with Scottish accents so thick you have no idea what’s going on, obvious and contrived set ups…
Like with One for the Money, casting is essential in a film like this in order to elevate traditional material like this. And casting Guy Pearce is, for my money anyways, a stroke of genius. Between him and Russell Crowe, I’ve always felt that Guy was the much better actor between the two of them because he’s the most chameleonic. To go from the bitchiest drag queen ever in The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert to the straight laced, by the book Ed Exley in L.A. Confidential to the memory impaired Leonard Shelby in Memento all the way to this summer’s Prometheus as Peter Weyland of Weyland-Yutani, demonstrates a range that most actors would kill for. And while this isn’t the first lead he’s done in a sci-fi film before (see the 2002 version of The Time Machine), this is the first “ultimate badass” part he’s played. While he doesn’t approach Kurt Russell levels of awesomeness, he works with what he’s given and does it fairly well. The real surprise is actually Maggie Grace. Gone are any hints of the annoying and useless Shannon on Lost or her older than her character, damsel in distress role in Taken. Here we have a character that is surprisingly competent and who can go toe to toe with Pearce. We also have Peter Stormare doing his usual shtick as well.
Ultimately, while Pearce is fun to watch and there are the occasional bits of excitement throughout the film, it is not the fun, pulpy sci-fi B film one would hope for.
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