'CARJACKED': Two and a Half Stars (Out of Five)
This is one of those movies that's mildly entertaining but you can definitely see why it was a direct-to-video release. It stars Maria Bello as a single mom fighting a custody battle and Stephen Dorff as a bank robber who steals her car, with her and her son in it. The film was directed by John Bonito (who also directed the popular John Cena vehicle 'THE MARINE') and written by Sherry and Michael Compton. The movie is pretty routine and probably exactly what most people will expect from it but Bello and Dorff do what they can with the material.
Bello stars as Lorraine Burton a mother who we meet at a support group, as the film opens, talking about her issues with her ex-husband and guilt over parenting mistakes. Her therapist has told her she's too ambiguous and her friends urge her to get 'angry' and 'take control' of her life. While picking up gas and frozen pizzas at a gas station, for her and her son Chad (Connor Hill), her car is carjacked by Roy, a bank robber desperately trying to avoid authorities. Roy then holds the two hostage as he forces Lorraine to drive him to a rendezvous with his partner and their stolen money. Along the way Roy and Lorraine get to know each other and work out some therapy on each other.
As you might have guessed ('spoiler alert') Lorraine does get 'angry' and tries to 'take control' of her life (and the situation), which is supposed to be inspirational I guess, but for me it fell a little flat. It's not horrible, it just didn't work for me, which is true of most of the film. The dialogue, thrills and action are all decent but nothing too impressive at all. The subtle scenes between Dorff and Bello are what did work for me about the film though. Nothing plot developing is very interesting but the small character driven scenes were somewhat amusing thanks in large part to Bello and Dorff's performances. Bello is always good but usually she plays the confident take charge woman, so seeing her as someone passive and insecure is a nice change of pace (even if a lot of the material doesn't work). Dorff isn't a great actor but he is good in the right role, which is playing himself and himself is a slight variation on Christian Slater (in my opinion). No great acting from Dorff here (or in any film) but when allowed to be natural he can be entertaining. In this film both actors are given times to shine which helps make up for every other way the movie is lacking.
Watch our review show 'MOVIE TALK' at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYPV4P9FyXg
This is one of those movies that's mildly entertaining but you can definitely see why it was a direct-to-video release. It stars Maria Bello as a single mom fighting a custody battle and Stephen Dorff as a bank robber who steals her car, with her and her son in it. The film was directed by John Bonito (who also directed the popular John Cena vehicle 'THE MARINE') and written by Sherry and Michael Compton. The movie is pretty routine and probably exactly what most people will expect from it but Bello and Dorff do what they can with the material.
Bello stars as Lorraine Burton a mother who we meet at a support group, as the film opens, talking about her issues with her ex-husband and guilt over parenting mistakes. Her therapist has told her she's too ambiguous and her friends urge her to get 'angry' and 'take control' of her life. While picking up gas and frozen pizzas at a gas station, for her and her son Chad (Connor Hill), her car is carjacked by Roy, a bank robber desperately trying to avoid authorities. Roy then holds the two hostage as he forces Lorraine to drive him to a rendezvous with his partner and their stolen money. Along the way Roy and Lorraine get to know each other and work out some therapy on each other.
As you might have guessed ('spoiler alert') Lorraine does get 'angry' and tries to 'take control' of her life (and the situation), which is supposed to be inspirational I guess, but for me it fell a little flat. It's not horrible, it just didn't work for me, which is true of most of the film. The dialogue, thrills and action are all decent but nothing too impressive at all. The subtle scenes between Dorff and Bello are what did work for me about the film though. Nothing plot developing is very interesting but the small character driven scenes were somewhat amusing thanks in large part to Bello and Dorff's performances. Bello is always good but usually she plays the confident take charge woman, so seeing her as someone passive and insecure is a nice change of pace (even if a lot of the material doesn't work). Dorff isn't a great actor but he is good in the right role, which is playing himself and himself is a slight variation on Christian Slater (in my opinion). No great acting from Dorff here (or in any film) but when allowed to be natural he can be entertaining. In this film both actors are given times to shine which helps make up for every other way the movie is lacking.
Watch our review show 'MOVIE TALK' at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYPV4P9FyXg