Though I was hardly looking forward to this film in the traditional sense (because it looked quite crap) I expected it would be a vaguely exciting, albeit braindead, romp if I waited till its DVD release. The idea of Jason Statham, who had looked a revelation in his Transporter franchise, once again tearing up the screen in what, it was claimed, was another non-stop action fest seemed too good to be true. And it was. Duh.
Crank is all mouth and no trousers. It's pre-release publicity screamed about it's premise: Statham's character is injected with a poison which will kill him in a few short hours, and which can only be kept at bay via intense bursts of adrenaline. If this wasn't a fine excuse to go all-out for 90 minutes then I don't know what is. And it probably would have been too if it wasn't so poorly executed. The script itself is little more than a blank canvass with some exclamation marks on it, yet co-directors Neveldine and Taylor fail utterly to utilise this in pursuit of total exhiliration and no conceivable plot. Instead what we get is a limp mess in which harassed Chev Chelios (Statham, playing Anglo-Greek presumably) runs around trying to get revenge against soon-to-be murderers.
The biggest problem is the shocking lack of excitement within what is supposed to be an all-action picture. Statham's intensely physical nature is hardly used at all, and the various set-pieces that spring up throughout the film are so poorly filmed as to be farcical. There is practically no hand-to-hand combat, and therefore no well-choreographed fight scenes, and the gun battles are of Supermarket own-brand quality, namely they're bland rip-offs of superior competitors.
While all this should easily be enough to make you wary of ever watching it, the worst condemnation has yet to be visited. Amy Smart, a terrible and very average-looking actress, is Statham's love interest, and while she manages to play a spaced-out dopehead well enough (lets face it, it's not hard) she is party to one of the most abysmal scenes in the film. Chelios, feeling weakened and in need of a boost, mounts her in public and starts banging away, much to her, um, delight. Yes it is as awful as it sounds, and sets the Feminist movement back ten years. Bravo Amy, bravo. |
