{Original Post Date 27 December 2012}
It's review time once again, my little ones, and before I get into the
review, allow me to set the scene for you. I am not a fan of Tom
Cruise. Personally, I think he's overrated. Don't get me wrong, he's a
decent actor, but he's not the hot shit that everyone makes him out to
be. And this has nothing to do with
Katie Holmes or anything like that. I've just never really been a fan
of his. So, unlike my last review, "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey,"
this review will be somewhat short.
Currently, "Jack Reacher"
is second at the box-office, behind the aforementioned "Hobbit" as in
its first week it only took in half of what The Hobbit did, even though
The Hobbit is beginning its third week. And there is good reason why
it's in second place. It's a Tom Cruise movie. And if Tom Cruise is a
part of the movie, you know it's going to shit gold. Tom Cruise stars
in the movie as the titular character Jack Reacher. Who was a former
Army Police Major. Jack Reacher pretty much became a ghost after he got
out of the army. As he has no cell phone, no e-mail, no files in the
government system... so he's pretty much this "ghost" who wanders the
United States for purposes that is never actually really defined. And
he's investigating the murder of five seemingly random civilian victims.
And without giving anything away, the entire murder set up is just
odd, but that only adds to very set-up to the rest of the movie... since
these murders take place at the within seconds of each other in the
same area.
But that's all I'm going to talk about as far as the
set-up of the movie goes. The action scenes are pretty well
constructed, the dialogue is engaging, and it doesn't try to dumb itself
down, nor does it always talk out of its own ass... well, except for
one fight scene were Jack Reacher is fighting at a bar. Here, Jack
Reacher is talking completely out of his ass... and even though it kinda
works in the context of the scene, it's the usual Tom Cruise pedantic
that you expect from Tom Cruise.
Still, surprisingly for me,
the biggest strength that "Jack Reacher" has is it's unexpected humor.
There are some genuinely funny moments. But even better than that were
moments that I'm not sure the movie was trying to be funny, but the
deliverance of certain lines that Tom Cruise had made me laugh. And
there is a completely hilarious fight scene, that I won't spoil, but
will have you laughing when you see it.
Which brings me to its
biggest flaw... and maybe this is just my bias against Tom Cruise, but I
feel that over the years, Tom Cruise has been typecast to movies like
this. Not once during the entire movie did I believe that Jack Reacher
was a different person than Ethan Hunt. Personally, I think that
someone else could have portrayed Jack Reacher. And again, I feel like
Tom Cruise was waxing pedantic to the other characters when he really
had no reason to for the majority of the movie. There's a line between
being a badass, and being whatever it was that Jack Reacher was being...
and while he does do a good job in most scenes that calls for it... the
bar fight scene made me groan.
If you can get over the fact
that this is another Tom Cruise action film... and the fact that there
was nothing really new in this movie that Tom Cruise hasn't done in some
other action movie... or if you just worship Tom Cruise, and feel that
he could do no wrong in your eyes, this is definitely a movie you'll
want to check out. If however, you're tired of the Tom Cruise action
movie, just know that there is a lot of good stuff to see... especially
it's unintentionally funny moments, I would probably wait until it comes
to HBO, or perhaps watch it on Netflix when it gets there.
For
me, while I wouldn't say this is an awesome movie for my bias against
Tom Cruise... I would venture to say it is a good movie.
And that my little ones, is my review. Tune in Next time, when I review New Year's.
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