Knight And Day (12A.)
Directed by James Mangold.
Starring Tom Cruise, Cameron Diaz, Peter Sarsgaard, Viola Davis, Paul Dano, Jordi Molla. 110 mins.
The first problem is that it has a pun on the characters’ names title that belongs on a naff TV show – Rosemary and Thyme, Crazy like a Fox, Hart to Hart. When indestructible omni-competent super spy Cruise met ditzy ordinary girl Diaz in a globe trotting espionage romp, it was murder.
Seriously, Cruise and Diaz are a horrendous pairing – like Jeremy Kyle and Fern Cotton fronting The One Show.
Cruise is CIA operative who may or may not have gone rogue, and inadvertently gets Diaz involved in his sequence of plane crashing/ train fighting/ exotic secret island/ bull running action sequences. Cruise is perfectly cast as a secret agent that nobody knows if they can trust. Apart from Magnolia I haven’t believed a single line he’s delivered in his whole career.
The joke is supposed to be the way he can remain casual and detached in the middle of chaos and destruction, but this absurd cool just comes across as creepy and inhuman. Often, as the bullets are flying, he has to very patiently and rather patronisingly explain to Diaz what is happening and what she will have to do next. Cruise delivers the lines like they are well worn patter, as if he was Bob Monkhouse going over the rules to a long running game show to a particularly dense contestant.
K&D is certainly not good, but it isn’t quite as bad as you might expect. Director Mangold (3:10 To Yuma, I Walk The Line) still has a shred of integrity and has tried to craft a blockbuster in the style of a sophisticated comedy thrillers like Hitchcock’s North by North West or The Lady Vanishes.
The action sequences are too dependent on CGIs and the first Mission Impossible film for inspiration but there are some inventive touches. Reportedly legions of writers had a crack at the script and a number of sequences look like they might have been quite bold in an earlier draft. Even John Powell’s score sounds like it is making an effort.
One of Hitchcock’s greatest skills was the way he could get audiences to accept the most outrageous, preposterous stories and ignore gaping plot holes. It’s the trick all his would be modern day acolytes (yes you Mr De Palma) have the most difficulty emulating. K& D tries to make light of it ridiculousness with an outrageous bit of Dewey machima involving having Cruise drug Diaz whenever they are stuck in an impossible quandary and have her wake up hours later in an entirely different situation.
It’s a nice cheeky move but it isn’t enough to win you over. Hitchcock could get away with things like that because he worked with such self effacing performers. Cary Grant or James Stewart were like an attentive maitre’ d; if the audience had a slight complaint they’d glide over and smooth over any objections.
Today’s performers take themselves way too seriously, are a bit too intense for such light fair. There is no dimmer switch to Cruise - his conception of a dashing romantic lead has the agility of Spider-man, the body count of Rambo and charms us with the regular brutal culling of henchmen, topped off with his trademark boyish grin.
Directed by James Mangold.
Starring Tom Cruise, Cameron Diaz, Peter Sarsgaard, Viola Davis, Paul Dano, Jordi Molla. 110 mins.
The first problem is that it has a pun on the characters’ names title that belongs on a naff TV show – Rosemary and Thyme, Crazy like a Fox, Hart to Hart. When indestructible omni-competent super spy Cruise met ditzy ordinary girl Diaz in a globe trotting espionage romp, it was murder.
Seriously, Cruise and Diaz are a horrendous pairing – like Jeremy Kyle and Fern Cotton fronting The One Show.
Cruise is CIA operative who may or may not have gone rogue, and inadvertently gets Diaz involved in his sequence of plane crashing/ train fighting/ exotic secret island/ bull running action sequences. Cruise is perfectly cast as a secret agent that nobody knows if they can trust. Apart from Magnolia I haven’t believed a single line he’s delivered in his whole career.
The joke is supposed to be the way he can remain casual and detached in the middle of chaos and destruction, but this absurd cool just comes across as creepy and inhuman. Often, as the bullets are flying, he has to very patiently and rather patronisingly explain to Diaz what is happening and what she will have to do next. Cruise delivers the lines like they are well worn patter, as if he was Bob Monkhouse going over the rules to a long running game show to a particularly dense contestant.
K&D is certainly not good, but it isn’t quite as bad as you might expect. Director Mangold (3:10 To Yuma, I Walk The Line) still has a shred of integrity and has tried to craft a blockbuster in the style of a sophisticated comedy thrillers like Hitchcock’s North by North West or The Lady Vanishes.
The action sequences are too dependent on CGIs and the first Mission Impossible film for inspiration but there are some inventive touches. Reportedly legions of writers had a crack at the script and a number of sequences look like they might have been quite bold in an earlier draft. Even John Powell’s score sounds like it is making an effort.
One of Hitchcock’s greatest skills was the way he could get audiences to accept the most outrageous, preposterous stories and ignore gaping plot holes. It’s the trick all his would be modern day acolytes (yes you Mr De Palma) have the most difficulty emulating. K& D tries to make light of it ridiculousness with an outrageous bit of Dewey machima involving having Cruise drug Diaz whenever they are stuck in an impossible quandary and have her wake up hours later in an entirely different situation.
It’s a nice cheeky move but it isn’t enough to win you over. Hitchcock could get away with things like that because he worked with such self effacing performers. Cary Grant or James Stewart were like an attentive maitre’ d; if the audience had a slight complaint they’d glide over and smooth over any objections.
Today’s performers take themselves way too seriously, are a bit too intense for such light fair. There is no dimmer switch to Cruise - his conception of a dashing romantic lead has the agility of Spider-man, the body count of Rambo and charms us with the regular brutal culling of henchmen, topped off with his trademark boyish grin.
