Brick Mansions – Review

Film, Reviews, Theatrical Reviews, Top Story

An oddly appropriate exit for Paul Walker

If Paul Walker hadn’t died earlier in2014 Brick Mansions would’ve never seen a movie theatre. It’s a pretty awful direct to video film waiting to happen that’s managed to find its way into theatres because of Walker’s death, nothing more, as someone thinks that the film can attract an audience as Walker’s last completed film role. As it stands it wouldn’t have gotten into theatres any other way as it’s an early candidate for worst film of 2014.

An American remake of the French film District 13, penned by the same writers (Luc Besson and Bib Naceri), the film opens in Detroit in the near future. A massive wall has been erected between the ghettos and the rest of civilization. A nuclear weapon has wound up in the “Brick Mansions,” the worst ghetto ran by drug dealing gun runner Tremaine (RZA) with plans to use it on Detroit. Hero cop Damien (Walker) is tasked to team up with Lino (David Bello), a criminal with ties into that world. He’s got personal reasons to help out, as his girlfriend (Catalina Denis) has been kidnapped by the same people. It’s also personal for Damien, as his dad was killed by Tremaine and his people.

The film follows the two through a variety of action sequences as they have to defuse the bomb before it’s fired off by Tremaine at the center of Detroit. Unfortunately it takes a fairly forgettable action film from a decade ago, one that found a cult audience on DVD, and manages to take nothing that was unique & interesting about District 13 into it. This is a paint by numbers version of District 13, everything that could be turned into something interesting with an American twist … into a generic action film that’s painfully dull and boring.

The one thing about District 13 that made it interesting was that it tried to be different. With a pulsing techno beat and crisp action sequences, with minimal transitions between them, District 13 was a rush of a film that knew exactly to be done. It also moved so fast that its flaws weren’t noticeable; it felt like a wild ride, ala The Raid and its sequel, because there weren’t extended moments connecting everything.

It was quick, brutal and efficient.

With a running time not much longer, Brick Mansions has a massive problem with its pacing and tone. Trying to replicate the original’s style with a more hip hop laden soundtrack with Detroit style artists, Brick Mansions is slow and dull as what should be minor points take a long time to get to. This is a film that is trying to stylize itself as a fast paced action film but doesn’t have the sort of tempo it should have. It makes everything feel dull and boring, taking forever to make simple points.

The other problem is that the film is trying to place to an American audience by making everything so personal for both main characters. What made Damien such an interesting character was that he was trying to stop everything out of a sense of duty. He was a cop’s cop, the undercover badass ad-hocking a plan to save the day. It was different motivation as opposed to “he killed my father, time to make him pay” that Paul Walker gets. Differing reasons made the unlikely friendship, et al, that springs forward such an interesting (and underused) aspect of the original that making them both united because “now it’s personal” is such a clichéd, unoriginal idea.

Hearing Walker talk about how this is about duty, et al, would have at least made it interesting. Instead it just panders to the easiest possible method of making Damien a hero. Damian in the original did it because of obligation and part of his character transformation at the end is going against his instincts, so I see why they wanted to go that route with a similar “he killed my dad” storyline that falls short. It’s another cliché in a film full of them when it wouldn’t have hurt the film to duplicate that character aspect entirely.

It’s an interesting choice from Besson and Naceri, who wrote the original as well, in adapting their own material again. It’s as if they wanted to try and correct the flaws from the original … and created even bigger ones in the process. The original wasn’t a masterpiece by any means, with massive gaping flaws, but Brick Mansions doesn’t do anything with that same flawed material and make it better. If anything its production only exacerbates them by taking out the things that made it interesting with clichéd, unoriginal and frankly boring choices to try and make this more American.

Director: Camille Delamarre
Writer: Luc Besson and Bibi Naceri based off their script for “District 13″
Notable Cast:
Paul Walker, David Belle, RZA, Catalina Denis, Gouchy Boy, Ayisha Issa