Escape Plan

Escape Plan (2013)

49% on Rotten Tomatoes (out of 101 reviews)

Runtime: 115 minutes

Directed by: Mikael Hafstrom

Starring: Sly Stallone, Arnold, Jim Cavizel, Faran Tahir

From: Summit Entertainment

To think that THIS was the first time action legends Sly and Arnold starred together in a motion picture. Then again, the only time and De Niro and Pacino starred together in a motion picture (Righteous Kill) it wasn't so hot either.

I've heard about this movie for awhile now due to various sites and messageboards I frequent. I was excited because of who the two leads are. Even when I found out recently that it wasn't really an action movie but was more a drama, I was still pumped up for it. What a letdown I experienced yesterday afternoon.

To steal the plot description from the IMDb: “When a structural-security authority finds himself set up and incarcerated in the world's most secret and secure prison, he has to use his skills to escape with help from the inside.” The location of this secret and secure prison... once I found out what it was, I groaned. It makes no sense, which ends up being one of the themes to this movie.

I ended up not really liking this movie at all. And those sites and messageboards by and large really enjoyed the movie and I just don't get it. There are amusing moments and some decent bits, but overall the main themes I got out of this were nonsense, non-stop contrivances, stupidity, and coincidences. What I mean by nonsense is that characters would disappear when they shouldn't have, important plot points come up out of nowhere and apparently you're just supposed to know beforehand what they are yammering about... and it seems like there's dialogue missing to connect things together. This is jut a badly-made movie, or at least badly-edited. This sort of film, I shouldn't be befuddled multiple times as to what in the hell was going on; this isn't a David Lynch movie for calling out loud! Yet there was confusing way too often for my tastes. Not even the action scenes were all that well-filmed or put together.

Stupid moments or nonsense doesn't necessarily ruin a flick for me. However, everything combined together with too much of this movie being unpleasant equals me thinking that this wasn't an enjoyable movie to watch. It wasn't the acting that was a source of the problems; besides the people listed already there's Sam Neill, Vincent D'Onfrio, Amy Ryan... and yeah, 50 Cent. Fiddy wasn't bad, at least.

Overall, what a disappointment this was. Then again it wasn't the only film to earn that tag this year. At least there's been a pleasant surprise or two but I hope to see 10 worthwhile movies to rate and rank for the Best of 2013 list I'll do, likely in early January of '14.

I'll be back Friday night.