Reviewed by Kate Rodger
Whether we like it or not, Tom Cruise is still one of the biggest movie stars in the world.
His image has taken a hammering over recent years, but let us remember he’s starred in some big blockbusters, the Mission Impossible franchise for a start, along with Spielberg’s War of the Worlds and Minority Report. He also caught Oscar’s attention three times, for Born on the Fourth of July, Jerry Maguire and Magnolia.
After a reputation-enhancing cameo in last year’s Tropic Thunder, Tom’s now back doing the action thing, opposite Cameron Diaz in Knight and Day.
Cameron Diaz (Vanilla Sky/Charlie’s Angels) is June Havens, who finds her everyday life tangled with that of Cruise’s rogue secret agent, Roy Miller. He’s being chased by his former CIA mates, and she gets dragged along for the ride, whether she likes it or not. Their campaign to stay alive stretches across the globe, in ever increasingly ludicrous plot twists and action scenarios involving car chases, motorcycle chases, and helicopter chases with multiple shoot-outs in planes, trains and automobiles.
There is certainly no expense spared on travel, with the action galloping across the US, Jamaica, Austria and Spain.
Where they didn’t spend the money however, was in some of the green-screen CGI, with some very obvious fake speeding backgrounds during some of the chase sequences. And if perhaps the intention was make some of the action sequence seem almost parody, then it was lost on me. The silliness of an entire plane of assassins each waiting their turn to one at a time try and kill Cruise rather than all going him at once just didn’t work for me, and I can’t help wondering whether the whole package will lack the necessary cred with the more demanding action audience.
Director James Mangold has delivered us some great cinema, 3:10 to Yuma I loved, but I just don’t know what the filmmakers intentions were here. The action’s not good enough to work as a straight action film, and it’s not funny enough to stand alone as a comedy. On the upside, there is a nice onscreen chemistry between Cruise and Diaz.
Maybe if you leave your brain at the door and do the popcorn thing it might pass the time, but even then, the sheer silliness of it still dominated for me.
Two and a half stars.
Knight and Day
:: Director: James Mangold
:: Starring: Tom Cruise, Cameron Diaz, Peter Sarsgaard, Maggie Grace, Paul Dano, Marc Blucas, Viola Davis, Olivier Martinez
:: Running Time: 109 mins
:: Rating: M - contains violence and offensive language
:: Release Date: July 15, 2010
:: Links: Trailer
