No Way Back

If you`re a fan of Toyokawa Etsushi, as I am, then fast forward over all the scenes that he isn`t in.(And enjoy the closeup of his gorgeous hands when he`s looking for a weapon in the airplane toilet.) Even most of the scenes that he *is* in are stupid. Russell Crowe fans will probably say the same thing about their man.

After watching this film I could see the great actor that Russell Crowe has become. The film although lacking a little in the story department, just needed a few added scenes, the actors were great. The comic relief was great. This film received an okay star rating from me and has good reason. You should take a look especially if you are a fan of the man now.

I find it hard to believe that I could dislike any film starring Russell Crowe, but this one is a complete waste of his talent -- and my time. I'd like to say that his acting job was a "rose among the thorns" but I don't think that even he was convincing. He was a foul-tongued protagonist [with an ugly hair-style that even his character couldn't have thought was becoming] who over-reacted to everything in this tortured and unbelievable plot. In retrospect, I wonder why I even gave it a "3".

What starts off as a fairly promising film completely collapses after the first 20 to 30 minutes. Kelly Hu plays rookie FBI agent "Seiku Kobayshi" who volunteers to go undercover as a call-girl in order to plant a listening device into the bathroom of a dangerous white supremacist organization. Once inside the organization she guns down the leader, "Victor Serlano" (played by Ian Zierling) and several of his men. When FBI agent "Zack Grant" (played by Russell Crowe) arrives on the scene, Seiku jumps out of the high-rise to her death. During the follow-up investigation it is learned that Seiku had very recently contacted an important leader of the Yakuza named "Yuji" (Etsushi Toyokawa). This results in speculation that she was somehow coerced by Yuji to kill Victor, so FBI agent Zack Grant is sent to Japan to investigate. A gun-battle then ensues and Zack arrests Yuji in order to take him back to the United States. Meanwhile, Frank Serlano (Michael Lerner), the father of the white supremacist leader, kidnaps Zack's son "Eric" (Andrew J. Ferchland) in order to pressure Zack to bring Yuji to him. On the way back "Mary" (Helen Slater) is introduced into the film as one of the flight attendants who becomes inadvertently involved in the scenario. So far so good. Unfortunately, it is at this point where the film begins to deteriorate as the audience is treated to one far-fetched incident after another. While Helen Slater played her part adequately, the same can't be said for Russell Crowe as this wasn't one of his better performances. But the main responsibility for this fiasco belongs on the shoulder of the director/writer, Frank A. Cappello. With the cast that he had he should have been able to produce a much better film. Instead he chose stunts and gimmicks over good acting and a reasonable plot. What a shame.

I watched the whole film mainly because Russell Crowe is a good actor and I found it entertaining although, admittedly, I did think about turning it off around halfway through. But it improves along the way.

It's interesting to see him at this early stage in his career. There's always going to be that review that criticizes an actor trying to use an accent for a role but I thought he did okay. In fact, I actually had to look up where he was born. Turns out, not NY.

Another thing I noticed is that someone said this movie would have gone straight to DVD in 1995. The irony here (other than the fact that movies were VHS back then) is that wasn't a derogatory comment back in 1995 - a lot of movies were actually made for places like Blockbuster and Hollywood video.

The film starts out a little slow and we're not really sure if there's some level of humor intended when they dress up what appears to be an FBI agent as a exotic call girl. The filming of her is so controlled that you feel like you're watching an adult film begin and they continue to focus on her as more of a China doll than someone who just learned on the top of a car.

The flight attendant seems to be the comic relief and the antagonist rolled into one but she turns out to be a good character - entertaining, necessay, and likable.

While the plot is a little confusing initially, by the end we're all caught up on why, who, and what. There's a surprise twist after several cat and mouse scenarios.

It's not a bad way to spend 90 minutes.