The Edge of Darkness (2010)
Directed by: Martin Campbell
Starring: Mel Gibson, Ray Winstone, Danny Huston
The Plot: Tell me if you've heard this one before: A Priest, a Rabbi, and a drunk blond walk into a bar.... Oh, you've heard it already? Alright. How about an evil corporation kills the daughter of a Boston city PD detective and he goes on the hunt for the men responsible? You've heard that one too? I guess I'm all out of jokes tonight....
The Good: No matter what I'm about to say about Martin Campbell's The Edge of Darkness the fact is that Mel Gibson The Actor still has enough congenital acting talent coursing through that moonshine still he calls a circulatory system to make even the most drab movie course with a fair amount of vitality and energy. If I'm going to complain about The Edge Of Darkness - and your peripheral vision may have picked up the length and depth of the verses below in the poorer sections of this movie review, so indeed I do - I won't be complaining about Mel Gibson's performance in the film. Yet I still can't shake one sickening question that may haunt me from this point on in my troubled, often angry, life...
The Bad: What is Mel Gibson even doing in a movie this terminally stupid? He doesn't need the money. I'm sure he's been offered other roles in other movies that didn't have an obviously circa-nineteen-nineties-Wesley Snipes-film-title like The Edge of Darkness. In fact I'm thinking the one person who's fuming about Mel's participation in The Edge Of Darkness is Harrison Ford. You stole a role that was rightly his Mr. Gibson - it would have made for a nice third act to Hollywood Homicide and Firewall....
Still, I'm scratching my head - confused, flabbergasted, brain-sick with mystery - wondering what Mel Gibson had in mind when he signed on for this project. Was this atonement to Hollywood for proposed right-wing affiliations since he made The Passion of the Christ? Did he take up The Edge Of Darkness like a vexatious crown of thorns and clamp it onto his troubled brow for past transgressions against the Hollywood throne of power?
Because if he did - GOD BLESS HIM. I can't tell you the agony of watching a gifted actor and filmmaker slumming it this hard just to right a wrong he may have committed against the wealthiest people in the most bankrupt State in the Union...
The Ugly: Haven't really touched on what's wrong with this movie yet have I? Marketing would suggest a revenge flick starring Mel Gibson. The movie, as it turns out, has all the logistical flair of an entire season of the Fox hit TV show 24 - but without the sweet release of three hundred Jack Bauer torture scenes to make the time spent worth the effort. Take 24. Remove the torture, interrogations, and mindless gun battles - the syrupy slop-bucket that remains is Martin Campbell's The Edge Of Darkness.
The problem with this particular movie is that we've seen the four hundred movies just like it previously during the last thirty years of film history. It should know this already. But it doesn't. We know that a group of corporate cutthroats are behind the murder of Mel Gibson's innocent daughter. (in The Edge Of Darkness our villains are rich, Ivy league, Republicans - sh*t, should have used a spoiler warning there...) But the film pretends that we don't know it. In fact, Martin Campbell, (heir Director) spends 3/4 of the film apparently weaving a web of intrigue and political conspiracy for the least intriguing storyline about political conspiracy ever devised by screenwriters guild flunkies and reprobates.
At the ninety minute mark, when Mel Gibson's cop is asking a smarmy United States Senator what was in the letter his dead daughter sent him - a letter the Senator threw away because of allegiances to corporate interests - I'm thinking: WHO CARES DUMBASS? PUNCH HIS GAWDAMN FACE FROM ITS MOORINGS! REACT!
Because at this point we know what was in the letter. Even if we were drinking heavily before the film, or blurring our mental capabilities with handfuls of angel dust, or our ears and eyes were beaten out by stainless steel meat hammers just as the movie started - we still would know what was in the letter. Mel Gibson however, does not know. And this guy made Braveheart.
There's so much wrong with The Edge Of Darkness it hardly bears any further illustration. It's predictable but doesn't think that it is. It pulls its punches through most of its running time. It's all wrong almost all of the time. Let's Verdict this bitch and move on with our miserable lives as theater junkies...
The Verdict: Imagine a dodgeball court. You're on one side of the line - a group of muscular college thugs are on the other. Your arms are tied behind your back. The young men are using every ounce of their lethal strength and energy to hurl hard, yellow dodgeballs at your face and chest. The dodgeballs all have "CLICHE" written on them in bold black letters. Now imagine the bombardment your exposed face is taking from these hard, yellow, fast-moving cliche-balls - because that's exactly what sitting through The Edge Of Darkness feels like.
Comments
If you didn't like this you probably won't like "Crazy Heart" either. It's this years "The Wrestler". Old washed up (insert profession here) meets a young woman, tries to turn his life around but is too much of a screw up to make it work.
Well Jason looooooved The Wrestler -- which I just recently saw for the first time, along with Roger Dodger by the way.
Nice review. It's nice to know that your love for Mel Gibson doesn't keep you from being honest about a turkey when you see one.
Steven - It's too late - my Brother saw 'Crazy Heart' this afternoon and swears I have to see it. I doubt it's anything like 'The Edge of Darkness'
Duzy - Glad you liked 'The Wrestler' - my wife doesn't like 'Roger Dodger' so much so I'm wondering if it's just a dude movie for movie dudes. Your thoughts?
Too bad this was such a dud it's written by William Monohan the guy who wrote Kingdom of Heaven and The Departed.
Oh and on a side note I LOVE Rodger Dodger. And I think Steven meant you wouldn't like Crazy Heart because it's premise is also over done but in my opinion execution means everything. I can't wait for Crazy Heart to hit my city.
I loved this review; probably because I fully agree with you on this movie.
Kanchan - I'm so glad that you thought that this movie was as bad as I thought it was. I was so let down.
Jared - Maybe it was an early Monohan script. I hope so. Cuz' that's who Mel's got on the payroll to write his Viking flick. Maybe Gibson's expertise at filmmaking can nullify a bad screenplay? Though I doubt anyone could have made 'The Edge of Darkness' any better.
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