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Talk about a
cinematic paradox. Neil Jordan, writer/director of The Brave
One, seems to believe that his implementation of
story-contrivances provides the film a much-needed source of
dramatic tension. The problem with his theory: said contrivances
come across as so far-reaching and so gawky within the context
of the plot that, before they can create any sort of nail-biting
atmosphere for audiences, they instead provoke unrelenting
laughter. Jordan expects viewers to believe that Jodie Foster’s
Violent Wonder Woman of a protagonist is beaten to the point of
comatose as her fiancé is brutally slain in Central Park,
confronted by a killer after she witnesses a crime of passion
take place in a convenience store, and nearly knifed on the
Subway – all within the period of about a month. The result of
this false expectation is absolutely ridiculous; even if Jordan
saw a need develop a sense of background behind the vigilantism
Foster’s character decides to take up in order to avenge her
fiancé’s death, he didn’t have to do so in such a morbidly hokey
fashion. In fact, the necessary suspension of belief required of
viewers in order for them to become absorbed by the film will
totally distract them from the brilliance of juiciest, most
natural meat of the story: the biting cat-and-mouse dialogue
between Foster’s newfound moral-murderer and Terrence Howard’s
bottled-up detective. Not to mention, everything one could hate
about The Brave One is amplified one-hundred fold by the
eye-roller of an ending, in which the two main characters end up
abandoning the personalities they’ve worked the entire
running-length to develop, simply for the sake of conveniently
tying up any loose plot-ends.
-Danny Baldwin,
Bucket Reviews
Review Published
on: 9.21.2007
Screened on:
9.16.2007 at the Edwards San Marcos 18 in San Marcos, CA
The Brave One is rated R and runs 122
minutes.
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