Forced situations falter in ‘The Brave One’

In theaters

THE BRAVE ONE, directed by Neil Jordan, written by Roderick Taylor, Bruce A. Taylor and Cynthia Mort, 122 minutes, rated R.

Expectations were high for Neil Jordan’s “The Brave One” – and why not? Those expectations, after all, were pinned to a gifted director (“The Crying Game,” “The Butcher Boy,” “Breakfast on Pluto”), and especially to one of our best working actors – two-time Academy Award winner Jodie Foster.

So, it’s a disappointment to report that those expectations aren’t met, at least when it comes to the story, which collapses in a run of bad decisions midway through after a promising start. As for the acting, it’s there that the expectations are met.

Based on Roderick Taylor, Bruce A. Taylor and Cynthia Mort’s script, this film about vigilante justice comes on the heels of Kevin Bacon’s “Death Sentence,” which it trumps, but more often than not the film will remind many of “Death Wish,” the 1974 movie in which Charles Bronson took the law into his own hands after his wife’s murder and cut a bloody swath through Manhattan.

In “The Brave One,” Jordan flips the situation by putting renegade justice into a woman’s hands. Think of Foster’s character as a version of Bronson’s character or, for that matter – and more interestingly – as Travis Bickel in “Taxi Driver,” the movie that featured Foster as a teen prostitute when she herself was a teen.

Here, Foster is Erica Bain, a talk show host at a New York City-based radio station who is set to marry her fiance, David (Naveen Andrews), when one evening in Central Park they are brutally attacked by a group of three skinhead toughs. They do so much physical damage to the couple that David dies while Erica, her face and body smashed, must begin a long recovery.

Her body heals, but her heart and her mind don’t. Frightened now by a city she no longer feels she knows, Erica purchases a gun on the black market, with the intent to protect herself should she ever find herself in that situation again.

And here is where the movie stumbles. Increasingly, it sinks into too many forced situations of vigilante justice as Erica becomes a magnet for repeated acts of violence – either against her or somebody else. Unable to contain her rage, Erica brings down all the bad guys in a hail of bullets, which gives the film energy, but the scenes will strike many as manufactured and false.

Is New York City really as violent as it’s presented here? Maybe as a whole. But many rightfully will question whether one person can be the target of such violence in such a brief period of time as Erica is here. It’s just overkill – overkill that overcomes the movie to the point that tension isn’t mounted so much as laughter is induced when Erica repeatedly starts to brandish her gun and kick some butt.

Quelling most of the unintended humor are the scenes Foster shares opposite co-star Terrence Howard, who plays the detective working the murders Erica is unleashing upon the city. They become friends, which at once allows the movie its most interesting relationship (Foster and Howard have terrific chemistry), and unfortunately, its greatest laugh just when the movie is trying to mount its dramatic peak.

In the end, “The Brave One” has enough in it, particularly its performances, to make it worth seeing when it’s released on DVD. Mary Steenburgen, for instance, and Nicky Katt, are pitch-perfect in supporting roles. Watching the movie, you wish for more of them and less of the ongoing run of contrivances.

Grade: C

On HD DVD and Blu-ray disc

ALEXANDER REVISITED: THE FINAL CUT, directed by Oliver Stone, written by Stone, Christopher Kyle and Laeta Kalogridis, 214 minutes, unrated.

How many times is somebody going to allow Oliver Stone to recut his 2004 film, “Alexander,” before they break the news to him that it just isn’t working out?

In a matter of three years, the movie has endured the original theatrical cut, which Stone hated, the 2005 “Director’s Cut,” which presumably he liked, and now comes the high-definition HD DVD and Blu-ray releases of “The Final Cut,” which adds an additional 40 minutes to the already bloated running time. From this, one might assume that nothing now remains on the cutting room floor.

Not that it matters much. No matter which way you slice it, it’s melodrama – not greatness – that drives the movie. Based on the tumultuous life of Alexander the Great, the movie is retooled in an effort to whip it into a higher, sudsier froth.

“Revisited: The Final Cut” is bigger, grander, messier. In its stampede of excess, depth is lost in favor of satisfying the necessities of a big-budget blockbuster. Violence, sex and action take precedence over substance.

This is camp filmmaking that exists on the surface. If you come to it again expecting a better biopic, you might be seriously disappointed. But if you enjoy a nice slice of Hollywood miscalculation every now and then (and who doesn’t, even a third time around?), you might have a good time.

With Colin Farrell in a dishwater blond mullet as Alexander and Val Kilmer as his controlling father Philip, it’s Angelina Jolie as Alexander’s mother, Olympias, who really startles. She doesn’t speak with a Greek accent. Instead, bizarrely, she sounds as if she’s channeling Kate Beckinsale’s Transylvanian trick from “Van Helsing.”

Individual scenes are compelling, such as the well-conceived battle sequences and Alexander’s relationship with his horse, Bucephalus. A bond is achieved between them that is touching and real. It transcends the silliness and says plenty about the movie’s real shortcoming.

Try as he may and cut as he may, Stone still is unable to make you care for any character, including Alexander, more than he makes you care for that horse.

Grade: C

Visit www.weekinrewind.com, the archive of Bangor Daily News film critic Christopher Smith’s reviews, which appear Mondays, Fridays and weekends in Lifestyle, as well as on bangordailynews.com. He may be reached at Christopher@weekinrewind.com.