Extraction

The makers of "Extraction" use the same marketing gimmick as used in films such as "The Cold Light of Day", "Fire with Fire", "The Prince" and "Vice". It's the famous Bruce Willis magic trick. Actually, it's dead simple. Make sure this star actor of yesteryear (I have to say I was always a big fan of BW) participates in an upcoming B-movie. However, the length of time you can admire him is limited and his presence is evenly spaced. You let him turn up at the beginning of the movie as an appetizer and give the impression that this might be a real Willis movie once again. Eventually, he disappears for most of the film and pops up again in the end for the big reveal. Then place him centrally on the cover so future viewers will get the feeling that he's playing an important part in it. I'm convinced that this is the biggest marketing trick that ensures the necessary revenues. As a viewer, you feel cheated though. Yep. The "Die Hard" star adds just another B-movie to his record of achievements. I must admit that the beginning of the film provided a momentary enthusiasm. For a moment, I had a feeling the old Bruce Willis was back and I was getting ready for some cool one-liners and beaten up opponents. Yippie kai yee! The result was a short-lived excitement, because before you know it the Willis marketing trick reveals itself and he disappears like a white rabbit during that well-known magic trick. Not in a black hat, but in the murky world of terrorists who captured a device called CONDOR. When activating this device, telecommunications will be disabled worldwide. Or something like that. Time for Kellan Lutz to show up. He plays Harry Turner, a CIA analyst who would love to follow in the footsteps of his father, but his application is always refused by the respective services. Until the day comes when someone kidnaps his father Leonard (Bruce Willis). Despite the explicit prohibition of his superiors to get involved, he still heads out to defuse that CONDOR. And this with the help of this other field agent Victoria (Gina Carano). And what a surprise, she's someone Kellan had a brief relationship with before. Who would have thought of that? What follows is just a cheap Secret Service action movie with the necessary fight scenes. And with of course the obligatory locations such as a biker bar (starring some billiard balls and a broken jukebox) and a trendy nightclub. Carano showed already in "In the Blood" that she can stand her ground in such dark clubs. The story brings nothing new and is full of familiar clichés. Even the denouement at the end was predictable. Not quite a good movie, you might say. The same can be said of the performances. Willis plays another comatose role and looks quite pathetic and uninterested in the few moments when he's on screen. Lutz and Carano make the best out of it and during the action scenes, the entertainment level rose a bit. And then there's the fact that Carano's curves are certainly a feast for the eye. I wouldn't date her though. Not with this testosterone-filled chunk of energy. Before you know it, you're stuck in a stranglehold that can be fatal. For now I've lost all hope for another brilliant Bruce Willis movie. Yippie kai ... yeah yeah yeah!

But you have to stick to the formula for making what's at heart a C movie actually entertain the target audience, drunk dudes. That formula? Simple storyline, bare bones dialogue, and expertly choreographed fight scenes that come no more than five minutes apart. The script was terrible from beginning to end. Bruce Willis tells a bad guy "Don't you ever threaten my family", just before delivering the kill shot. Immediately I got a bad feeling, because the line should have been "Nobody threatens my family" in order to make sense as far continuity. That may seem like a small detail to someone who isn't a writer but trust me, words matter. The dialogue never gets better and though most of the fight scenes are okay, enough of them are badly staged that it detracts from the only thing that makes the film worth seeing. The acting was below average with the exception of Bruce Willis, who phoned it in but is still a veteran. Gina Carano was under utilized, which seems to keep happening to her. There are too many bad movies that are still a lot of fun for you to waste time on this one. 4 out of 10.

Newly trained CIA Agent Harry Turner (Kellen Lutz) learns that his father, Leonard Turner (Bruce Willis), a seasoned CIA agent has been kidnapped by terrorists who also want The Condor, a unit that will control all the telecommunications on the planet. Harry wants to rescue his father and fix the Condor so it can never be activated, but is told to stand down (Whaaaat??) and, of course, he doesn't.

We thought we would get to see the birth of another Jason Bourne in Harry Turner, but things didn't work out that way. Oh, Harry seems to have good fighting moves, but the production values stymied this to such a point we are not sure any more. The Director had the camera speeded up to such a point everything was a blur, the fights lasted too long (Jason Bourne wouldn't have let that happen) and the fights choreography were suspect. Much of the movie involved car chases which bordered on being quite boring. And lastly there were just way too many scenes in darkened areas. Not good.

Bruce Willis' name was used to draw in an audience and it worked, but we see very little of him as CIA super-agent Leonard Turner. In a word, this was quite disappointing.

Notables: D.B Sweeny as Harry's boss; Gina Carano as Victoria a CIA agent tasked to keep an eye on Harry.

There is a major twist later on, but we were not impressed. Kind of old hat when you see it.

We will have to wait a while longer to see a viable replacement for Jason Bourne. HA ! (3/10)

Violence: Yes. Sex: No. Nudity: No. Language: Yes.

Nothing wrong with this film, it's what it is: very formulaic and predictable with high production values and action scenes. CIA Dad, who is villainous and murderous himself, get's caught in a sticky situation as CIA son, who is an institutional failure, must rescue him, as CIA son is of course the only one who knows what's going on and where CIA dad is being held captive. CIA son of course inadvertently uncovers a deep institutional betrayal in which his tattered, nuclear family somehow wins and becomes transcendent. A murdered mother is avenged but it has zero dramatic power, but it's excusable as they didn't take it too seriously. Does it deliver? Not really, but then it isn't boring either. Nevertheless It's being dissed as "straight to DVD" (which is true) but compared to the junk released in theaters, it's probably above average, really. Nothing special, nothing terrible, perhaps worth a watch on a rainy day. Not bad enough to be funny, not good enough to pay 100% attention to, it's more or less "just there".

I agree with most of other reviews when suggesting that Bruce Willis' name was simply used as an attractant. It isn't anything like normal Bruce films - this needs to be put on the bonfire and never seen again.

All the main actors Bruce Willis, Kellan Lutz, Gina Carano, D.B. Sweeney, Joshua Mikel, Steve Coulter, Theodore Sitterson were all good but I feel could have been so much better. The exception for me here was Gina Carano who I thought looked fantastic and was out- acting all others.

Also, son-of-willis got a few cuts on his face from a fight near the beginning which lasted throughout, but Gina Carano had a close-range face punch in a car later (with the perpetrator saying "sorry about the face" before he hit) yet she didn't have any marks on her face thru- out the film.

However, the one main criticism I have of this film is the VERY ANNOYING and persistent, and persistently bad music virtually ALL THE WAY THROUGH.

Don't see this movie. You know you won't get your 83 minutes of life back !