Alex Cross

Alex Cross (2012)

12% on Rotten Tomatoes (out of 119 reviews)

Runtime: 101 minutes

Directed by: Rob Cohen

Starring: Tyler Perry (LOL), Matthew Fox, Edward Burns, Rachel Nichols, Jean Reno

From: Summit Entertainment

Yes, I actually watched this piece of crap last night. Once again I'll copy and paste what I wrote on Letterboxd about this but I'll expand on it. To steal the plot description from the IMDb:

“A homicide detective is pushed to the brink of his moral and physical limits as he tangles with a ferociously skilled serial killer who specializes in torture and pain.” That's really all the description that is needed.

Oh, why did I decide to watch this last night? Sure, I wanted to see how bad it was & if it was as awful as I had heard from multiple reliable people. But, they were right. At least I saw it for free on a Showtime channel.

This is the first time I had seen the Alex Cross character on screen (he was played previously by Morgan Freeman in films I hadn't seen before) & aside from his brief role in Star Trek, I have never had the "pleasure" of seeing Tyler Perry act. I avoid his movies as if they are AIDS! But, I can tell you that he was really awful in this role, either overacting or underacting. This big lumbering oaf as a super-smart detective with seeming psychic powers... I did not buy him in the role at all. Besides that, the other roles and acting jobs are pretty blah too. Fox as the villain was just more strange and odd than anything else. He was like a sinewy Henry Rollins, but believe me he was no Henry Rollins.

The fact that the movie reveled in doing bad things to quite a few female characters... pleasant, real pleasant. Then again, the whole film has a stench of unpleasantness attached to it so I can't really recommend it even to laugh at all the stupid sh*t that happens. My personal favorite was being in the back seat of Sinewy Henry Rollins' Cadillac CTS-V Coupe as he leaves a parking garage. What was up with that? It looked like it was filmed on a crappy handheld camera and it stuck out in a bad way.

Not shockingly, this was badly directed. An important battle is ruined by a horrid case of shaky-cam BS. But what ruins everything is a crappy overly convoluted mess of a story where you don't give a damn about any of the characters. No matter the famous actors in it (besides the people mentioned already there was also Cicily Tyson and John C. McGinley), they can't help make the bad story any good.

I was able to watch it in full without wanting to turn it off. Still, you don't need to ever watch this. I've complained on sites other than this one how stupid modern Hollywood is, filled with corporate bean-counter BS and other awfulness that leads to so many wide release theatrical movies in the United States being mediocre at best. To think that some geniuses decided that a movie with this lead star and director would be better than one that would have starred the awesome Idris Elba and been directed by David Twohy. Imagine those two with a non-awful script... sigh.

I shall return tomorrow night.