Image courtesy of www.impawards.com
Director :
Tony Scott
Cast :
Denzel Washington……….Doug Carlin
Paula Patton……….Claire Kuchever
Val Kilmer……….Agent Pryzwarra
James Caviezel……….Carroll Oerstadt
Adam Goldberg……….Denny
While Tony and Ridley Scott may do a lot of things differently in their editorial work in both story-telling and script selection, the one thing they both seem to share in common is their maddening inconsistency. From their chairs Gladiator, Alien, Man on Fire and Top Gun, amongst others, have flowed out of to critical and commercial acclaim. Equally loathsome that the two have come up with have been Domino, Days of Thunder and G.I Jane, amongst others. There is no level of mediocrity between them; it’s either excellence or awfulness. After last yea’s Domino, the “good” Tony has once again reemerged with the science fiction thriller DéjàVu.
DéjàVu stars Denzel Washington as Doug Carlin, a bomb expert for the ATF investigating an explosion on a ferry boat in New Orleans which killed many and wounded others. He’s one of the ATF’s best, and as such is recruited by FBI Agent Pryzwarra (Val Kilmer) into a top secret unit to help investigate the bombing and, hopefully, find the man responsible using some very interesting technology. To go any further would ruin the film, as merely describing the story spoils large portions of it but needless to say Tony Scott has crafted a fairly intelligent thriller with science fiction overtones.
The film appears to be a science fiction thriller at first, using plenty of high level physics and the inherent paradoxes and problems with it, but this is more accurately a thriller with science fiction overtones as opposed to a true science fiction film. And like any good thriller, Tony Scott has ratcheted up the thrills to keep the film moving quickly. This is an intelligent film, more so than any of his recent efforts, and as such the film deserves patience and attention to detail; one can easily get confused or lost while viewing it due to many moments early on that end up becoming larger moments later in the film.
DéjàVu, for all its strengths in plot and story, fails to grasp the greatness it could be because of some of Tony Scott’s usual defencies as a director. The film has several moments of awkward pacing in key moments, including one right in the middle where the film becomes akin to a high level physics lecture in quantum mechanics that will go over the heads of many in the audience, that bring the film crashing down. For the most part it’s a slick thriller that moves quickly, but there are some sequences that are either out of place or whose pacing doesn’t match the rest of the film. Dead moments in an otherwise fast moving tend to drag down DéjàVu, but the other thing that drags the film down are its rather pedestrian performances from its cast.
And with a top level star in Washington, as well as three strong supporting actors like Kilmer, Adam Goldberg and Jim Caviezel, one would expect a much stronger acted film. This is much more of a directo’s film than an acto’s one, as the film is much more about the story than it is about the characters involved in it, but with such a talented cast it’s interesting to note how average they are. Washington is game for the role, for the most part, but this isn’t one of his better performances and one could think he’s only in the film to be the recognizable protagonist that an audience can sympathize with. Likewise the supporting cast are all usually much better in similar roles; it’s just that everyone involved seems to be cast more for their ability to be accepted than for their talent as thespians.
Throw in one of the more innovative, and most certainly unique, car chases of the last 20 years and Tony Scott has crafted a good but not great thriller. While it’s much more of a film that’s story-centered as opposed to character-centered, one can only imagine how good the film could’ve been with a bit better character development and a higher level of acting overall from a cast that’s generally better than it turns out to be.
