Drop Zone

<*sigh!*> Am I the only one this entire sad, weary world who notices that all these action films use the exact (and I mean exact!) same plot? Or am I just the only one who cares?

As action movies go, this one is OK, I guess. (But that's a little bit like saying "As cases of diarrhea go, this one was OK.") On the plus side, the aerial photography depicting the skydiving scenes was spectacular. There were the requisite number of explosions, chase scenes, and witty banter on the part of both the hero (Wesley Snipes) and the villain (Gary Busey), delivered archly in the expectation that one of their ripostes might become a popular catchphrase. And Yancy Butler is not too hard to look at, either.

However, if I pay $8 or $9$ to watch a film, I expect a little more than something made from a cookie cutter. Hollywood spends a great deal of time, effort and money putting together movies with extraordinary special effects, and they've become quite good at it. OK, so I'm impressed! Can't a few more of them work a little bit on story, characterization and dialogue? Is that really too much to ask?

As I watched this movie (and to be fair, I stumbled across it on television rather than paying an exorbitant ticket price at the theater; this probably made me more disposed to be tolerant) All I could think was that this is what Coleman Francis might have made had he had a bigger budget. Maybe he would have thrown in more coffee, cigarettes, booze and bad tempered swearing as well.

Drop Zone is an action ride from start to finish starring Wesley Snipes as a detective hunting down the men who killed his brother. No, the movie won't win any academy awards, but it is a thoroughly enjoyable action romp. The action is excellent, the girls are gorgeous, and the musical score is top notch. If you go in looking for a touching movie, don't bother. But if you just want something to enjoy for a couple hours of visual fun that requires little mental exercise, this will do quite nicely.

Pete Nessip and his brother are escorting a federal prisoner to trail. The prisoner is a top code breaker. On the plane terrorists take over, kidnap the prisoner and sky dive out of the plane – Nessip's brother is killed in the raid. Nessip pursues the gang to uncover what really happened, joined a group of skydivers led by Jessie Crossman. Meanwhile Moncrief is working out his plot to secretly uncover the identities of all DEA agents and sell them to a local drug lord.

After the disaster of Passenger 57 you could understand if Snipes had passed on any more airplane related movies, but this is much better than 57 was. The story is daft of course, but it does allow plenty of good aerial photography and some good action scenes. However it takes itself a bit too seriously. It came out in the same year as Terminal Velocity (Charlie Sheen's skydiving movie), where TV was much more fun to watch as it never took itself seriously, Drop Zone loses the fun a bit by taking it all as a serious movie.

Despite that Snipes is really good – as in 57 he is able to rise above the material and give a strong central performance. His charisma carries him even when his lines are weak and as usual his fight scenes are impressive. Busey does his usual bad guy stuff easily and is so-so and the rest of the cast are ok. The most interesting thing about the cast for me was the `Homicide, Life on the Street' connection that saw tow great actors from that cast in small roles here, namely Kyle Secor (who played Bayliss) and Clark Johnson (who played Lewis).

Overall this is a solid action film. It's nothing special and not overly impressive but it passes 90 minutes without leaving any negative (or positive) marks!

A '4' is twice what this turkey deserves (a '2') but it's appropriate for a number of reasons, and the primary reason is John Badham who does an excellent job when given something to work with (WarGames, Stakeout 1 & 2, Point of No Return, Bird on a Wire, et al). But since making this flick all his movie projects have been real duds. Maybe there's a connection?

Another two reasons are Yancy Butler and Claire Stansfield who provide the requisite eye candy. Another reason is Gary Busey who always knows how to play the stereotypical slime ball and do it at least half well. And the final reason is the skydiving which is exciting.

But that's where it ends. This is otherwise a movie much like Do or Die, made with preconceptions in mind ('hey let's make a movie with lots of skydiving sequences') and no worries if the story actually makes any sense. And don't you worry about it either because it doesn't. One could elaborate here but those elaborations would be spoilers. And hey - dramatic denouement it ain't but if you don't got that...

So why a '4' instead of a '2'? Why when the lead is being done by - Wesley Snipes? Why indeed? Precisely for the above reasons - and because as a whole it's exciting and not a total waste of time. In other words it isn't Gone with the Wind but maybe you don't feel like seeing Gone with the Wind tonight anyhow.

Drop Zone (1994)

** (out of 4)

Gary Busey plays (what else?) a crazy DEA agent who decides to work the other side of the law by stealing various computer files. The difference is that they basically drop out of the sky and onto planes where they get the information, which means cop Pete Nessip (Wesley Snipes) must train in skydiving to go after them.

There were some great action pictures that were released in the 1990s but DROP ZONE certainly isn't one of them. I still remember watching this in the theater and the buzz after the movie was over was everyone being really letdown. I mean, you've got a likeable action star in Snipes and a great villain in Busey yet the end result was something rather boring and certainly not exciting.

I think the biggest problem was the screenplay and the entire idea of this skydiving team doing all of this stuff. It just seemed very far-fetched that all of this could happen and there just wasn't any drama or suspense in the movie. I think the lack of suspense is due to the filmmakers wanting us to suspend our brain function a bit too much.

For the most part Snipes turns in a good performance and Busey is always fun to watch but neither man is given much to work with here. Their characters are clearly trying to draw off of some of their earlier work and there's just no fresh magic in DROP ZONE.