Thanks for the information but I'm gonna kill you anyway!

Rating: 7/10 (14 March 2005)

That's pretty much what this movie is about. Denzel Washington plays Creasy, an ex-assassin hired to protect the cute little daughter of a wealthy industrialist couple in Mexico City. The daughter gets abducted by some career kidnappers which makes Denzel extremely livid. He goes out with the intention of destroying everybody responsible and/or involved with the kidnapping, which provides for a good opportunity to see people buy the farm in horrible ways. My choice of the word destroy is not an exaggeration. With one guy in particular, he stuffs a wad of plastic explosive up the dude's butt and well.... you put the rest together. The movie in itself is entertaining but kind of thin. I mean, it's a very simple plot. Yeah there's a twist or two but the movie is basically what I mentioned earlier: a kidnapping and then a tour of revenge. There are some good lines here, my favorite being the one where Denzel says something along the lines of forgiveness being a matter to be discussed between the guilty person and God and he's just there to arrange the meeting. Couple that with the fact that he's holding a rocket launcher while he's saying it and it's pretty funny and frightening at the same time. I thought the dynamic between Creasy and the little girl Pita (Dakota Fanning) was genuinely touching. Though I knew that she was going to be kidnapped, it only made their early scenes together more emotional. One thing that left me feeling a bit annoyed with the film was the direction. I love Tony Scott but I think he can get a bit ham-fisted with the visuals. The combination of shaky camera work, Ginsu knife editing and bleached out color nearly made me go back to the credits to make sure that the movie wasn't directed by Michael Bay. At points, the camera moved so much that I was wondering if they were administering shock treatments to the camera operator while he was working. Even something like the pouring of a drink is filmed to be an all out assault on the senses. The use of subtitles are executed in such a way that they call just a little too much attention to them. While it's an interesting aesthetic choice, I don't need to see subtitles flying in from the right side of the screen and then have half of the words fade out and the rest of the letters explode outwards... Christ, just keep it simple! Anyway, to end the review, I'll say that I enjoyed the movie but it could've used a little less style and a bit more substance. Denzel makes this movie more than watchable and while it's not the most violent movie I've ever seen, it's always fun to watch people get creamed, especially when they deserve it.
RATING ***1/2 out of *****.