Movieline Online

THE FLICK: It’s finally become fashionable to bash the French. And why not? Their opinion of Americans seems to be colored almost exclusively by celebrity coverage on E! and the glut of Hollywood movies invading their county. So if turnabout is fair play, then I should be able to use District B13 as some sort of social barometer for French culture, right? Consider the challenge met, my froggy friends. Luc Besson is the Gallic equivalent of Jerry Bruckheimer, pumping out middle-to-high-class action films with a regularity matched only by a senior citizen on Metamucil. The glory days of his directing career (La Femme Nikita and The Professional) seem to be behind him, but his stylistic influence is an overwhelming presence in every film he produces. District B13 mixes the hyperkinetic look of Besson’s previously successful Transporter franchise with the latest fad in fighting styles: free running or parkour. Defined by Wikipedia as “the ability to quickly access areas that would otherwis...

THE FLICK: It’s always exciting to bear witness to that unique Hollywood phenomenon of directorial carte blanche; when a filmmaker has earned enough street cred or box-office mojo to do whatever they hell they want with no studio interference. More often than not the project emerges impossibly flawed (any of M. Knight Shyamalan’s films post-Sixth Sense, for example), embarrassingly self-indulgent (Tarantino’s Death Proof segment of Grindhouse, to a tee) or off-the-mark anti-climactic (Bryan Singer’s recent Superman redux). But there’s something about all those films that is still eminently “watchable.” They’re the product of filmmakers freed of the usual fiscal responsibilities; no fear of script notes, no test audience peer pressure. So even if they crash and burn, they’re putting something up on the screen that a studio pawn like Brett Ratner never will: the unexpected. After earning more money than God with The Passion of the Christ, Mel Gibson decided to stay independent, producing...

THE FLICK: You won’t find many people who’d debate The Road Warrior’s status amongst the best action films ever made. Words can’t describe the experience. Perhaps that’s because director George Miller uses so few of them, preferring to construct his apocalyptic sequel to Mad Max with bravura action set-pieces, culminating in a relentless 20-minute chase sequence that will likely never be topped in the history of cinema. Bold statement, I know. But The Road Warrior (or Mad Max 2 as it’s known in Australia and now presented uncut on Warner’s remastered Blu-ray DVD) is the sort of bold filmmaking that only happens every 50 years or so. It’s a film that quite literally cuts to the chase, introducing its players in broad but colorful strokes and defining their character through action rather than words. Its success launched a myriad of apocalyptic copycats, but none of the could replicate the full-throttle, vehicular mayhem Miller put on screen...not even Miller himself in the next sequel, ...