The Courier

As a fan of 'the transporter', I looked forward to this, because it's 'the courier'...which means basically the same. Only this time, not so much with cars. The movie started out great, getting to know the courier and his type of work, just finishing a job. He is then forced into his next job, which is a bit out of his comfort zone - making an unknown delivery to an unfindable crime lord - played by Mickey Rourke! The premise allowed for so much, I was genuinely excited by now - but I soon got disappointed. As a whole, the delivered briefcase, the job, and the impossible plot made no sense. All the obligatory elements in the movie viewed apart - the sidekicks, the stolen airplane, the torture, the assassins, the bugged apartments, the murders, the arrests, anagrams, and much more... - had a feel of pointlessness and irrelevance to it, as if someone just grabbed some spy story ingredients and threw them together. Our courier stumbles through his unlikely adventure to complete his job and gets, true to the movie, an ironic surprise ending that made no sense. A total let-down.

The Courier is a strange little flick that dabbles in the kind of pulpy narrative which the 80's were famous for. One lone antihero sets out to deliver a package of enigmatic value to a recipient that is always one step ahead of him, proving to be quite elusive. Bad guys and gals hinder him at every turn and violence ensues, leading up to an inevitable confrontation and in this case a neat little twist that admittedly defies any sort of reason, yet is fun for the actors to play out and provides sensationalism, a trait that's commonplace in such films. Jeffrey Dean Morgan is a haggard presence in any role, a guy you immediately feel rooted to in a scene. He gets the lead role here, playing an underground criminal courier, passing along dangerous goods from one cloak and dagger person to another. His latest task comes from his handler (Mark Margolis): Deliver an odd case to a reclusive criminal mastermind known only as Evil Sivle. Little information is given beyond that, but it soon becomes apparent that his mission is a cursed one, as he finds himself a hot target for all kinds of weirdos. German live wire Til Schweiger plays a dirty federal agent who hassles him with that campy charisma and narrow eyed theatricality that only he can bring to the table. Miguel Ferrer and Lilli Taylor are priceless as Mr. & Mrs. Capo, a pair of married contract killers who discuss their dinner plans whilst hunting their quarry, and have devised some truly vile torture methods involving culinary instruments. Yeah, it's that kind of movie, where B movie mavericks are let off the chain and allowed to throw zany stuff into their otherwise pedestrian material that often borders on experimental. Morgan is assisted by a young chick (Josie Ho) who saves his ass more than a couple of times. Mickey Rourke shows up late in the game as Maxwell, a mysterious Elvis impersonator and Vegas gangster who plays a crucial role in Courier's quest. Trust Rourke to take a derivative, underwritten supporting character and turn the few minutes of screen time he has into utter gold that elevates his scene onto a plane which the film as a whole is sheepishly undeserved of. Morgan is better than the flick too, but he's great in anything. He ducks the heroic panache of the action protagonist and dives into growling melancholy, his grizzly bear voice and imposing frame put to excellent use. This one got critically shredded upon release. Yeah it ain't great, but it sure as hell ain't terrible. Worth it for a cast that makes it work, and for that classic genre feel that can't be beat.

OK this film isn't bad.

The first reason why it's disappointing it's because - just like Black Death (2010) - it tries to "keep it real" way too much .. films need escapism, to a point, and here it almost seems that they decided to go full speed for the not-Hollywood look.

Now i'm not one to defend Hollywood, but what kills this film is that the direction is poor; it fails to capitalise on the realism, instead giving me a film that looks like an amateur production. Some of the shots are truly amateurish, and often the camera-work fails to make a scene interesting.

Having said that, The Courier isn't half bad, there are plenty things i liked in it, from the fight moves to the casting (the lead is a bit wooden, the girl fits the part OK~ish, the detective is perfect), and the whole production is pretty decent.

I also don't subscribe to the whole "it's full of cliché'" thing; if anything, it tries to avoid clichés in a film genre where everything has already been done.

All in all, i can say that it's an interesting film to watch, even though i get the feeling the director has a background in TV - seriously, you (whomever you are) truly murdered what could have been an interesting flick.

So, after all considerations, i give The Courier a decent 6/10 - better than MI3, and no Tom Cruise.

This movie certainly had style. It seemed to be directed well. Editing was crisp enough and on the surface it looked pretty interesting. Cinematography was basically very good and quite inventive with a lot of action. But the whole package was a mile wide and an inch deep because the screenplay was a muddled mess, the storyline was laughably inane. Mickey Rourke and Lili Taylor, two actors who can really deliver the goods, were incredibly wasted and about a third of the way into it you realized it was going to be all style and no substance, and that was when I just stopped caring. A clue as to what happened comes when the credits roll. Producers, co producers, associate producers, executive producers galore. Too many cooks in the kitchen destroyed the soup. I've never quite seen a movie like this that had promise and so much energy put into production, but ultimately fell flat on it's face. The first movie that I've seen where I'm completely at a loss as how to rate.

Never heard of this movie before? Well, keep it that way! There is absolutely nothing worth seeing about this movie, that is basically being just a very standard modern action flick, with a poor story but even worse storytelling.

Quite weird and surprising to learn that this movie got directed by Hany Abu-Assad, who definitely has class and skills in him and is mostly known for directing smaller type of movies, with a strong message in them. Most definitely not dumb action flicks such as this one!

I can see what kind of approach they were going for but they obviously failed with it. They tried to create a smaller and more realistic type of action movie but the story and its characters really aren't suited for that. I actually believe I might had liked this movie better, had it been done as a silly and over-the-top action-flick, in a more '80's type of style.

The movie has a very simple concept but it makes things needlessly difficult. Because of this you will start to loose interest in it all pretty fast and after a while you simply have no idea what is going on anymore, simply because you just don't care about anything that is happening. The storytelling really makes this a far from pleasant movie to follow. Just imaging a Chuck Norris flick, with all of its clichés, getting told as a serious movie. That should give you an idea of how this movie is like.

Those who are looking for a movie with plenty of action to enjoy will also end up feeling disappointed by this movie. This movie feels like such an extremely low-budget one and things don't get any more exciting than a couple of poorly filmed gunfights. Certainly nothing spectacular, surprising or exciting about this movie.

Just forget about it!

4/10

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