Ignition - Tödliche Zündung

I expected a B grade movie - but this was MUCH better than B grade.

Well directed, produced and acted and INTELLIGENT (a rare commodity these days).

It's not the best movie I've ever seen, but it's a better quality movie than most of the so-called "block-busters" I've seen recently...

Routinish, yet sometimes entertaining, action and suspense flick which worst sin is not taking itself seriously. It all becomes more and more implausible along the way and the script writer seems to realize it by adding some humor. No problem with that except the movie didn't start like a great joke and even seemed a nice variation on Ridley Scott's "Someone to watch over me", with an exciting subplot involving the U.S. army. Watch it just for fun and, of course, for the amazing Lena Olin.

We have a rare opportunity to see our hero in this early starring role as good guy bodyguard Gallagher assigned to protect a reluctant lady judge. Our independent lady judge (Olin) underestimates her need for protection. A potential witness in a military investigation alerts the judge to his own concerns for his safety as the intended target of a military cover-up of fraudulent activity. Other potential witnesses have disappeared under mysterious circumstances. Gallagher and Judge investigate disappearances, creating more peril for themselves when military bad guys begin to target them. Their collaboration leads to a more personal relationship between divorced Gallagher and single judge.'But they have to thwart a military-planned presidential assassination as a part of the fraud cover-up ahead of acting on any personal feelings. Gallagher has a cute daughter that he introduces to the judge after all the action. I enjoyed this movie because it is well-balanced with good guys, bad guys, personal relationships, action and significant problems to solve. Our heroes prevail because they figure out how to work together and trust each other. There are some unexplained and incredulous escapes that can happen only in movies. But the rest of the plot lines seemed plausible to me. Pullman fans will see foreshadowing of the well-intentioned but flawed Detective Ambrose character now developed in The Sinner TV series.

Despite being fired for drug use and violent conduct, Conor Gallagher returns as a US Marshall to protect lawyer Faith Mattis when her life is threatened as part of some sort of bombing campaign against certain high-profile people. At first Gallagher tires of Mattis' attitude and accepts her threat of having him reassigned. But when he saves her life from an attack, he is kept on and finds himself rescuing her from a solider that has gone awol and thinks someone is trying to kill him. Starting to put the pieces together with her though, brings both of them into danger from powers that are more than just criminal.

The presence of Bill Pullman made me overlook the Monday night slot on channel 5 – usually a dumping ground for direct-to-video action movies with no names and no real value. When the film opens with a nicely washed out scene, I also ignored the clichés of the shoot-out and the predictable route it takes. However the next scene is 9 months later and Gallagher is "washed-up™" but brought back into the fold and it was here that I realised this was only going one way. The film keeps the actual "plot" at bay for the majority of the running time and instead just keeps producing narrow misses and bangs along with some vague attempts at characterisation. When the true plot actually comes out, it is pretty poor and unconvincing – with the ideas being as realistic as the shuttle backdrop.

The bangs are just wheeled out with little realism and they didn't engage me at all, while the characters aren't anything interesting or different. The film's mood swings around as well – at times it wants to be serious but other times we have joking in the face of danger; the swings don't fit together that well and gives the film an unsure feel. The cast are caught up in this and it shows. Pullman tries to do something serious with the role but also ends up being a clichéd quipping action star; he never fitted into the genre and I couldn't shake the feeling that he is really better than this. Olin also seems ill at ease in it and comes across like she is trying to do something with nothing (and achieving nothing). Feore is a "rent-a-baddie" here and adds little value, while Kent and Harris are just henchmen to be knocked off after a bit of stand-offing. Lea and Ironside are familiar faces but add nothing more than that.

Overall this is an average thriller at best. All the clichés are there and are delivered without imagination or effort by a cast who mostly deserve to be in better stuff than this. No better or worse than a lot of the video thrillers doing the rounds as television filler but that isn't any sort of recommendation.

When all's said and done, the suspense build-up and chase has been done a thousand times over but it seems to work in this movie until the last twenty minutes when I have two gripes. First, the special effects ain't all that special - that's a real let down for a film that has some well shot action scenes prior and decent suspense. Second, the most implausible action finale (which I won't relate so i don't spoil it for anyone). Surely something more probable could have been thought of? Not to mention the contradictory threat which couldn't have occurred. For what began as a decent film, it was a real shame to be let down so badly at the end.