Goodness! I've always had a soft spot for Richard Dreyfuss all the way back to Close Encounters of the Third Kind. He just had this charm in him, his characters almost always give out a snickering smile even when the situation's serious. It's there in Jaws, Nuts, Goodbye Girl etc. And when I saw Dreyfuss' name headline this revenge actioner, I told myself, "this, I wanna see." I didn't doubt he could pull it off.
And truth be told, his Ben Myers does carry some weight of conviction. But that's about where the good stuff ends. Well, Mira Sorvino & Pruit Taylor Vince do throw in whatever character-acting chops they have into their scenes, but everything else falls into the category of Bruce Willis' latest cinematic hobby - straight to dvd territory. Bad lighting, patchy camera work, & sloppy editing. I could hardly believe that two Oscar winners in Dreyfuss & Sorvino landed into this mess. Taylor Vince included. What were they thinking? Or do they need to find new agents? Throw in other amateur actors whose screen demeanour quickly reveals that much, and you wonder, just what path did Dreyfuss take to come to this place at this stage in his career? I sure hope he doesn't tread the Bruce Willis path.
