Very entertaining, but hardly the best action film ever.

Rating: Null/10 (25 July 2003)

*** out of ****
Easily John Woo's most acclaimed Hollywood film to date, Face/Off is often mentioned among lists of the top action films of all-time. But I can't say I agree, I didn't even think it was the best action film of 1997; that honor belongs to Wolfgang Petersen's nail-biter, Air Force One. What Face/Off has going for it is an ingeniously silly premise and Woo's expert hand at crafting mayhem. Both aspects work well enough to make this a fitfully enjoyable thrill ride, but never quite as satisfying as it should have been.
John Travolta stars as Sean Archer, an FBI agent whose son was killed by a terrorist named Castor Troy (Nicolas Cage). After years of exhaustive search, Archer tracks down Troy and his brother, and captures both siblings after a violent shootout. But his brother, Pollux, reveals that a bomb is set to detonate somewhere in Los Angeles, and the FBI have little clue as to the whereabouts of the explosives and when its set to go off.
So one agent comes up with a wild idea, and shares it only with Archer and his partner. It appears there's a secret laboratory that has enhanced technology capable of removing a person's face and placing it on another "patient." The plan is to place Archer uncercover secretly in prison as Castor, but everything goes wrong when Troy awakens from his coma and takes Archer's face and identity, and even his family life, leaving the real Archer stuck in prison. Knowing this isn't a prison drama, you can guess what's going to happen from there.
John Woo is an adept action director and his work in Face/Off is superb. The action rolls at a breakneck pace, mostly with bloody shootouts, much of them employed in balletic slow motion, adding a graceful touch that somehow feels appropriate. There are also exciting fights and even a pulse-pounding boat chase in the finale.
Human drama is actually quite effective here, with Joan Allen giving us a solid and likable character who's caught in this whole mess, wondering who to trust and how to escape this nightmarish situation. Nicolas Cage is just as good in creating a likable character in Archer, which is all the more amazing when you consider that he begins the film as a psychotic villain. Even the sexy Gina Gershon brings humanity in a role as a protective, but crime-prone mother. Woo also plays on the whole good vs. evil concept, and it works just fine; there are the requisite doves and, uh, face/offs.

With great action and characters, what's wrong with the movie?
Right off the top of my head, it's John Travolta that bugs me the most. Not only is he an overrated actor, he doesn't make a particularly convincing action star. Overweight as he was at the time, watching him perform so many flips and death-defying stunts (obviously done by stuntmen) is too difficult to believe, perhaps even moreso than the silly premise of this film itself! And when the transformation occurs, Travolta's performance doesn't match what Nicolas Cage gave us in the opening. Sure, he's equally off-the-wall and insane, but he's actually just giving us another rendition of his villain from Broken Arrow.
The opposite can be said for Nic Cage (for the most part, he does go too over-the-top in a few instances), who actually improves upon Travolta when he becomes Archer, displaying frantic emotions with more urgency and believability. As an action star, he's more physically cut for this kind of stuff. Watching Cage perform balletic flips and outrageous stunts provokes an adrenaline rush, rather than an unintentional laugh.

The whole concept behind the movie is highly improbable, and the film manages to make it seem even more unlikely! As far as dramatic intentions go, the premise works, particularly in a scene where Cage as Archer tries to convince Allen that he's her husband and another scene where Archer's daughter holds a gun toward both men, not knowing who to shoot.

But, man, this story is filled with plot holes. The most noticeable right off the bat is the FBI agent whose ear is shot off in the opening gunfight. When Travolta visits the lab, he sees the scientists and technicians rebuilding this man a new ear. As stated before, this lab is meant to be secret to even the FBI, so how the hell would this agent explain to his co-workers how he got this new ear? Castor (when played by Cage) is a fairly thin man. Archer (when played by Travolta) is a fairly chubby guy. I'd like to know how these scientists made the relatively thin Castor into a chubby guy. Whose idea was it to keep this whole undercover plan secret to the FBI? Sure, I see the need to keep it from leaking to the prisoners, but shouldn't at least the head of the FBI be aware of what's going on, so just in case the unthinkable happens, they'll know how to deal with it. For that matter, how can such a laboratory, full of the latest in high-tech equipment AND holding the world's most dangerous terrorist, be left with absolutely no guards at night? And why the heck did Nick Cassavetes kiss Gina Gershon (who plays Cassavetes' sister) full on the lips from just out of left field (okay, I realize he was a thug and was dying, but how many people do you know would give such a sleazy kiss to their sister as a farewell?).

With so many infuriating plot holes, Face/Off annoys almost as often as it thrills. Admittedly, I had a higher opinion of it before repeat viewings, but the best action films still hold up in spite of implausibilities (Indiana Jones, Speed, Air Force One, The Mummy) because they possess a certain magic that keeps them above the rest of the crop. Face/Off has style to burn and action that gets more exciting as it moves along, but by the end, I just didn't feel that much-needed movie magic that would have attained this masterpiece status.