James Woods

  • The Hard Way (1991)

    The Hard Way (1991)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, September 2020) Let’s face it: building a buddy cop movie around a hardened non-nonsense police officer and a frivolous Hollywood actor trying to gather inspiration is an evergreen premise. It’s good to bring in both the gritty policework and the innate humour of an outsider, along with a pinch of Hollywood satire. (It was such a solid premise, in fact, that it’s shared with that other 1991 movie, Into the Sun, about which the less said, the better.) Being able to claim John Badham as a director is a further coup, and having no less than James Woods as the hard-boiled cop and Michael J. Fox as the Hollywood celebrity is just icing on the cake. With Stephen Lang as the serial killer and Annabella Sciorra as the love interest (along with briefer roles for an ensemble as diverse as Delroy Lindo, Luis Guzmán, L. L. Cool J, Christina Ricci and Lewis Black), everything is there for a competent Hollywood film. The Hard Way more or less meets those expectations, with a few issues along the way. Woods and Fox play each other off quite well, even through the rote sequences of early distrust and gradual bonding. The film isn’t so successful as blending the menace of its villain (a bit overdone for a comedy) and feels creepy in its depiction of a cop regularly practising police brutality, but scores a few hits in describing how a Hollywood megastar can have a few problems “going undercover” when everyone knows their name. The metafictional material doesn’t stop there, what with specific problems when the investigation movies inside a movie theatre that happens to be playing the movie in which the actor stars, and a rather elegant envoi that blurs the lines between the film’s reality and the movie it inspired. Much of The Hard Way is rather predictable, but that’s not a bad thing considering the practised skill through which it’s executed. Less interesting are the three or four climaxes that cap the picture—two would have been enough, three is excessive and four gets ridiculous, even though the best and most interesting sequence is kept in reserve for the final climax. The Hard Way isn’t some kind of undiscovered gem or early 1990s classic, but it’s good enough and slick enough to please even despite its flaws.

  • Against All Odds (1984)

    Against All Odds (1984)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On TV, July 2020) As much as the idea of remaking classic noir film Out of the Past is promising, most will agree that Against All Odds ends up being a curiously inert romantic thriller. Clearly part of the 1980s trend of remaking noir movies, it’s perhaps too successful in loosely updating the material that it ends up feeling more like a generic 1980s thriller rather than carrying anything of its illustrious predecessor. Jeff Bridges is not bad (and bearded) in the lead role, while a young James Woods is quite creepy as the antagonist. Meanwhile, Rachel Ward does better than expected as a femme fatale with shorter curly hair, but she too does mark the film as mid-1980s vintage. The story advances forth through a trip to Mexico and back, sombre sport fixing schemes, assorted criminals and vengeful lovers, but remains middle-of-the road throughout. Workmanlike direction from Taylor Hackford doesn’t help. At a minimum, Against All Odds does hold attention and delivers a story of love, crime and death, but it’s nowhere near its Out of the Past inspiration, and doesn’t feel special in any way.

  • The Specialist (1994)

    The Specialist (1994)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On TV, March 2019) There is really no reason to watch The Specialist for what it delivers. At best (and that’s stretching things), it’s a mid-1990s action movie that suffers from comparison to the genre’s wilder and better entries. It’s about bombs, so exhaustingly so that much of the script’s slight ingeniousness has been put into showcasing as many situations as could be solved through a well-placed bomb. Naturally, credibility isn’t The Specialist’s strong suit, and it’s comfortably outclassed by the other “bomb” action movies of 1994, Speed and Blown Away. So, what’s left to justify a look at The Specialist? A few details, such as the charmingly quaint look at mid-1990s BBS technology. But mostly the acting—for all of its faults, The Specialist can still boast of a strong trio of lead actors: Sharon Stone could play a strong female lead like no one else at the time, while Sylvester Stallone’s boorish charm remains distinctive and James Woods still makes for a great villain. But that’s not much, and all three of these actors have been served by better similar roles in better similar movies. Despite the strong Miami atmosphere, The Specialist is almost entirely forgettable—you may enjoy a few things along the way (and truth be told, fast-forwarding from one explosion to the next may be the most entertaining thing to do with the film), but I’m not sure that it’s worth a look nowadays.

  • The Virgin Suicides (1999)

    The Virgin Suicides (1999)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On DVD, September 2016) Director Sofia Coppola’s films have been hit-and-miss as far as I’m concerned, and The Virgin Suicides won’t settle anything in either direction. I’m certainly not the target audience for a film trying to make sense of the suicide of five sisters, often seen from the perspective of the male teenagers who almost worship them. It’s a film that delves into nostalgia (as narrated from a perspective years later, looking back on the seventies), plays in nuances, doesn’t offer a definitive conclusion and likes to spend time with its characters without necessarily advancing the plot. Dramatic ironies abound—such as when the boys plan a rescue and find out that their help is irrelevant. The subject matter makes it a sad movie, but its execution is perhaps not always as sad as you’d suppose it from the premise. Kirsten Dunst is very good as the oldest sister, while Kathleen Turner and James Woods also make an impression as the parents; perhaps inevitably, most other performers recede in the background of an ensemble cast. The Virgin Suicides certainly offers a change of pace from strongly plot-driven film, so it takes a leisurely frame of mind to appreciate the film in its subtleties. As with other Sofia Coppola movies, I can’t help thinking that there is something in there that I can’t reach.

  • White House Down (2013)

    White House Down (2013)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (Video on Demand, January 2014) Director Roland Emmerich is a consummate entertainer, and showing White House Down alongside Olympus Has Fallen, the other great White-House-siege film of 2013, only serves to list why he’s so good at what he does: Good balance between action and humor, clean editing, just-enough character development and a willingness to go insane at appropriate moments… along with self-acknowledgement of outlandish material. The numerous points of comparison between both films only serve to highlight what White House Down does best: Channing Tatum is credible enough as the accidental hero (he’s got confidence without swagger, making him relatable), Jamie Foxx is just fine as a “47th president” clearly modeled after the 44th one, the “threat matrix” idea for the antagonist is ingeniously-executed, the action sequences are vivid without being gory, and the film manages to navigate a tricky line between national symbolism and overblown jingoism. White House Down‘s crowd-pleasing dynamism means that the film as a whole feels like one big competently-executed formula and that’s just fine: the film is easy to watch and enjoy, the only sour note coming late in the conclusion as another wholly-unnecessary antagonist is revealed with a Scooby-Doo-level lack of subtlety. The film is possibly never better than when it acknowledges its own presidential-lawn car chase absurdity with a well-placed “Well, that’s not something you see every day.” –although the “just like in Independence Day” quote comes close. Good turns by numerous supporting players (Maggie Gyllenhaal, Richard Jenkins, James Woods and a remarkable Jason Clarke whose character is best imagined as being exactly “that guy” from Zero Dark Thirty) add just enough to make the film even more enjoyable. While White House Down comes with the usual action-blockbuster caveats (formula all the way, and don’t think too much about it), it’s a remarkably successful example of what it tries to do, and it’s hard to give a better recommendation for this kind of film.

  • Videodrome (1983)

    Videodrome (1983)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On cable TV, March 2012) The media landscape has changed so much in thirty years that there was a real risk that Videodrome, in tackling the TV anxieties of the early eighties, would feel fatally outdated three decades later. In some ways, that’s true: at a time where gory execution video-clips are never farther than a Google search away, the premise of satellite channel piracy uncovering a snuff TV show doesn’t quite have the same power to make audiences shiver. The average moviegoer now has effortless access to a vastly more complicated media diet in which can be blended the worst perversions: Videodrome really scratches the surface of the horrors out there as we realize that we now all have access to the same. But there’s a lot more to Videodrome than a treatise on the dangers of satellite TV and a charming throwback to early-eighties techno-jargon: As the body horror of the film’s second half kicks in, director David Cronenberg (who, a long time ago, still made horror movies) truly uncaps the techno-surrealism that still makes the film worth a look. Videodrome still deserves its cult status as an unnerving piece of bizarre horror, perhaps even more so now that cathode-ray tubes are receding in the past. The visuals, as imperfect as they were in a pre-CGI age, still have a sting and the shattering of the protagonist’s reality is good for a few kernels of terror. What really doesn’t work all that well is the last act of the film, which disarms the film’s increasing sense of paranoia and ends up burying itself in pointlessness. Videodrome, even today, is more interesting for its potential rather than its execution. Oh well; at least James Woods is captivating as the protagonist, and Toronto gets a pretty good turn in the background. A stronger third act would have been a good way to wrap up the film, but as a cult classic, it probably doesn’t need any improvement.