FILM REVIEW OF "ESCAPE PLAN" (2013)

Action superstars Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger co-star in “1408” director Mikael Hafstrom’s “Escape Plan” (*** OUT OF ****), an audacious but improbable prison break epic that delivers brawny thrills and chills galore.  Unlike the last two “Expendables” outings, Stallone and Schwarzenegger appear here on equal footing in more than rather than a couple of scenes.  Basically, we’ve got “Rocky” and “The Terminator” tangling with Mr. Reese from the provocative, CBS-TV thriller “Person of Interest.”  If you’re expecting another wise-cracking yarn with our heroes spouting clever one-liners, you’re going to be disappointed.  Indeed, little of the dialogue in “Escape Plan” deserves to be immortalized on bumper stickers.  Refreshingly, neither do our stars make any references to their previous Hollywood blockbusters.  Everybody plays it straight-forward in this survival-of-the-fittest saga.  Meanwhile, most of the testosterone-laden action consists of men either beating or shooting the living daylights out of each other in examples of outlandish, over-the-top violence.  Stallone is cast against type as a mature, serious-minded, MacGyver-like hero with a Houdini talent for crashing out of prisons, while Schwarzenegger plays one of the most dangerous men alive behind bars.  Jim Caviezel is cast against type, too, as a villain so dastardly that you will squeal with glee when he gets his comeuppance.  Former British soccer star Vinnie Jones chews the scenery with relish as Caviezel’s second-in-command.  Jones’ evil  prison guard shows no qualms about smashing inmates to a pulp as if they were drums.  

Scenarists Miles Chapman of “Road House 2: Last Call” and Jason Keller of “Machine Gun Preacher” generate plenty of suspense about the mysterious setting of the prison.  After an exciting introductory sequence at a Colorado prison where our hero demonstrates his masterly escape artist credentials, the remainder of “Escape Plan” occurs in an imposing penitentiary designed for the worst of the worst.  Essentially, the convicts occupy cells that resemble glass cages stacked atop each other and framed with steel beams.  “Source Code” production designer Barry Chusid has surpassed himself with this visually intriguing setting.  Well-armed, incorruptible, prison guards decked out from head to foot in black uniforms with sinister Guy Fawkes masks reminiscent of the police in director George Lucas’ dystopian sci-fi chiller “THX-1138” patrol the premises.  An around-the-clock surveillance system denies the inmates any privacy.  Hafstrom and his writers will keep you guessing for about an hour into the action where this impressive pen could be situated.  When Stallone finally figures out its whereabouts, the revelation is comparable to the lair of a James Bond villain.  While “Escape Plan” recycles some of the usual prison movie shenanigans, the imaginative setting sets this movie apart. 

Ray Breslin (Sylvester Stallone of “First Blood”) has broken out of 14 prisons over the last eight years.  He has formed his one-of-kind company with Lester Clark (Vincent D'Onofrio of “Full Metal Jacket”) along with Abigail (Amy Ryan of “Green Zone”) and computer wizard Hush (Curtis '50 Cent' Jackson of “Get Rich Or Die Tryin’”).  Out of the blue, the Central Intelligence Agency makes Ray an offer that he cannot refuse.  They challenge Ray to break out of their super-max slammer, and they are prepared to pay him twice his usual million dollar fee.  Initially, Ray doesn’t like the set-up.  Abigail and Hush share his dread.  Lester thinks it will be a picnic.  Reluctantly Ray accepts their dare against his better judgment.  Predictably, things go badly from the outset.  Our hero is abducted, drugged, and the homing device embedded in his body that enables Abigail and Hush to track him is removed.  The moment Ray awakens in his exotic prison cell, he wants out of the proposition.  Unfortunately, he learns that he is going nowhere.  It seems treacherous Lester has double-crossed him, and Warden Hobbes (Jim Caviezel of “The Thin Red Line”) has orders to keep him permanently on ice.  Ironically, Ray discovers Hobbes has designed his prison security measures based on Ray’s book about the most common structural flaws in prison security!

Ray finds himself surrounded by a formidable population of inmates that want to kill him.  Initially, one of these brutes is Emil Rottmayer (Arnold Schwarzenegger of “The Last Stand”), and they don’t cotton to each other.  When Ray clobbers Emil with his first blow, Emil observes with a smirk, “You hit like a vegetarian!”  When the Muslim brotherhood decides to gang up on Ray, Emil changes his mind and comes to our hero’s rescue.  Eventually, Ray and Emil become friends.  Ray explains that he has been paid to break out.  He suffers a number of set-backs, but he recovers from Hobbes’ savage treatment with Emil’s help.  Ray reveals his formula for success.  He must study the layout of the prison, and this means he must incite a riot so Hobbes can throw him in solitary confinement.  Solitary confinement is the equivalent of Hell where inmates are caged up and subjected to a blazing battery of search lights that turn the cage into an oven.  Ray notices the screws that in the floor plates are steel rather than aluminum.  He suspects the prison may be located in a vast underground cavern.  Next, he scrutinizes the rotation of the guards and their routines while they watch the inmates.  The most important part of Ray’s plan is finding somebody on the inside who will help them since he is cut off from Abigail and Hush.  The most likely candidate is the prison doctor, Dr. Kyrie (Sam Neill of “Jurassic Park”), but he displays considerable reluctance.

Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger should have teamed up long before “Escape Plan” because they radiate convincing camaraderie.  Director Mikael Hafstrom never lets the momentum lag, and he minimizes the clichés that crop up in most prison flicks.  For example, the Muslim inmates are rehabilitated as heroes after they join Ray and Emil.  Our heroes suffer considerably at the hands of the sadistic warden and his lieutenant before they triumph.  The worst thing about “Escape Plan” is that its exterior computer-generated imagery appears less than spectacular.  

extravanza

FILM REVIEW OF ''PARKER" (2013)

The brawny Jason Statham crime thriller “Parker”(*** OUT OF ****) qualifies as uneven but entertaining.  Too many characters converge in this above-average revenge melodrama.  Hispanic diva Jennifer Lopez plays one of those extraneous characters in “Black Swan” scenarist John J. McLaughlin’s flawed screenplay.  Cast as a divorced, debt-ridden, real estate agent, Lopez never gets intimate with her rugged “Transporter” star.  Instead, she is stuck in a supporting role and lends only minimal sizzle to “Blood In, Blood Out” director Taylor Hackford’s otherwise high-octane actioneer.  In one scene, she strips to her undies for our suspicious protagonist to see if she is wearing a wire.  Meantime, our hero has somebody else, in an even smaller role, who attends to him after he’s been shot, stabbed and beaten up.  Nevertheless, when Lopez isn’t chauffeuring Statham around scenic Palm Beach, Florida, she is meddling with his carefully laid plans the same way Lucille Ball used to interfere with his Cuban band-leader husband’s nightclub show in the “I Love Lucy” television comedy.  This energetic R-rated epic follows the exploits of a tough-as-nails professional criminal named Parker who lives by a strict code of ethics that reflects his principles.  He doesn’t harm anybody who doesn’t ask for it, but robbery is still his bread and butter.  When an armed guard nearly succumbs to a heart attack, Parker calms him down while he steals from him.

Statham isn’t the first actor to incarnate Parker.  If you’re counting, “Parker” marks the sixth time Hollywood has adapted the late Donald E. Westlake’s crime novel that he penned under the pseudonym Richard Stark.  Initially, French New Wave director Jean-Luc Godard changed the sex of the role for actress Anna Karina who played Paula in “Made in USA” in 1966.  Lee Marvin took a bullet as the same character with the name Walker in director John Boorman’s violent shoot’em up saga “Point Blank” in 1967.  Jim Brown played him as McClain in director Gordon Flemyng’s account of a hardboiled hold-up in “The Split” in 1968.  Robert Duvall landed the role as Macklin in director John Flynn’s “The Outfit” in 1973.  Finally, Mel Gibson appropriated the part as Porter in director Brian Helgeland’s gritty, bullet-riddled “Payback” (1999).  If you haven’t seen these previous adaptations hardboiled melodramas, you should put them on your wish list.  

“Parker” opens with an explosive heist at the Ohio State Fair.  Parker (Jason Statham of “Safe”) supervises an elaborate heist with four partners with whom he has no history.  This quartet masquerades as either clowns or cops, while he dons the collar of a clergyman.  They plunder the concession booth and make off with hundreds of thousands of dollars.  A case of arson designed to distract the authorities so the gang can make a quiet getaway concludes with the tragic death of an innocent bystander.  No sooner has this criminal quintet fled with their ill-gotten gains than Melander (Michael Chiklis of “The Fantastic Four”) insists Parker chip in his share of the loot so they can finance a $50-million haul in Palm Beach, Florida.  Naturally, since our hero doesn’t trust his accomplices, he refuses to join them.  Melander pulls a gun on Parker, and they careen recklessly down a public highway trying to control Parker.  Parker beats them up and then bails out the window.  He slams into the asphalt and lays there stunned.  August (Micah A. Hauptman of “S.W.A.T.: Firefight”) shoots him once and disposes of his bloody corpse into a ditch.  Miraculously, Parker survives this near-death ordeal and lucks up when a family stops to help him out.  Our hero awakens in a hospital as the police are making inquiries about him.  Cleverly, he manages to elude them despite both  the trauma and his gunshot wound.  He tracks Melander and his trigger-happy goons down to sunny Palm Beach, Florida.  Parker’s escape from the hospital and his improvised methods for boosting cars and getting cash-on-the-run are fascinating stuff.  Not long after Parker arrives in Florida, he hooks up with Lesley (Jennifer Lopez of “Enough”) and uses her to find where his ex-partners are holed up in an elite population.  “Parker” loses momentum at this juncture before it recovers with a suspense confrontation between our amoral hero and the dastardly quartet of hoods.  

Despite the alluring attraction she provides, Jennifer Lopez could have been deleted entirely from "Parker."  After all, what is the point of having a looker like Lopez if she is not the hero’s romantic interest?  Meantime, Hackford and McLaughlin confine Parker’s girlfriend Claire (Emma Booth) to the periphery with little to do aside from fleeing from his assailants and nursing our hero’s wounds.  She doesn’t have enough time to make much of an impression.  Michael Chiklis, Clifton Collins Jr., Wendell Pierce, and Micah A. Hauptman are thoroughly convincingly as ruthless criminals who leave Statham for dead on a road with a bullet in him.  Unfortunately, we don’t learn much about these thugs since Hackford and McLaughlin concentrate on the plight of Lopez’ hard luck character.  Looking way past his prime as Statham’s mentor, Nick Nolte spends most of his time growling his lines of dialogue as if he were recovering from a hangover.  One of the best close quarter’s combat scenes pits Statham against Swiss actor Daniel Bernhardt, who replaced Jean-Claude Van Damme in the “Bloodsport” franchise.  For the record, Statham and Bernhardt performed their own stunts in a knock-down, drag-out, brawl.  This bruising man-to-man knife and fistfight qualifies as one of the highlights of “Parker.”  Clocking in at just shy of two hours, “Parker” could have been leaner and meaner had either Lopez’s scenes been trimmed or the two women had been merged into one.  Nevertheless, die-hard Statham fans will enjoy the white-knuckled shenanigans in this muscular melodrama. 

FILM REVIEW OF ''BLADE" (1998)

Actor-producer Wesley Snipes may have finally found himself an action movie franchise that he can sink his teeth into with British director Stephen Norrington's "Blade," (***1/2 out of ****)a well-made, imaginative, adrenaline-laced vampire chiller based on the Marvel Comics' super hero. Snipes heads a first-rate cast that includes Kris Kristofferson, Stephen Dorff, N' Bushe Wright, Udo Kier, and Traci Lords. "Blade" synthesizes the exotic swordplay of the "Highlander" epics, the double-digit body count of a John Woo thriller, and the martial arts pandemonium of a Jackie Chan opus to spawn a horror movie several cuts above your ordinary vampire fare.

If the sight of blood, especially torrents of bogus blood, turns your stomach, avoid "Blade." "Blade" takes its cues from renegade vampire sags like Robert Rodriguez's "From Dusk Till Dawn" (1996) and Kathryn Bigelow's "Near Dark" (1987) rather than those venerable classics such as either Tod Browning's "Dracula" (1931) with Bela Lugosi or Neil Jordan's "Interview with a Vampire: The Vampire Chronicles" with Tom Cruise (1994). The Snipes hero must have chose the same guy who tailored "Mad Max" and "The Terminator" in what essentially constitutes an apocalyptic version of Fran Rubel Kuzui's "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" (1992). "Blade" qualifies as a tour-de-fang chiller with darker humor than "Buffy," top drawer special effects, and an infectious techno-pop soundtrack. Lowbrow escapism that it ranks as, "Blade" benefits chiefly from scenarist David S. Goyer's solid, seasoned writing skills and atmospheric, innovative helming by sophomore director Stephen Norrington.

Scenarist David S. Goyer provides an invigorating screenplay. "Blade" bristles not only with lively action and adventure, but also an intelligible plot that the characters go to extreme lengths of describe and discuss. When you consider that Goyer has penned scripts for "Dark City," "The Crow 2: City of Angels," "Robert Heinlein's The Puppet Masters," "Demonic Toys," and "Kickboxer 2," then you know he qualified as the ideal choice to pen the script. Goyer's revenge fantasy script never leaves you in the dark about a bloody new world where its embattled but immortal hero Blade wages a perennial war against vampires. Goyer shows impressive flexibility in co-opting vampire mythology. At one point, a half-blooded vampire smears on sun screen lotion to shield himself from the sun. Jealous vampires put one of their vampire enemies to death by gradually exposing him to sunlight at dawn. Meanwhile, our hero uses an ultra-violet light to singe unruly fangsters. About the only vampire trait neglected by Goyer is the ability to shape-shift into a bat.

A vampire infected our protagonist's pregnant mom, Vanessa Brooke (Sanaa Lathan of "Love & Basketball") with its venomous blood while she was carrying Blade in her womb. Delivered by Caesarean section from his dying mother, Blade emerges as neither totally human nor truly vampire. He can walk in sunlight without risk, and neither silver nor garlic can faze him. One villainous vampire admires Blade when he observes that Blade has "all of our strengths and none of our weaknesses." The filmmakers milk dramatic tension from Blade's growing tolerance to Whistler's (Kris Kristofferson of "Convoy") anti-venom serum. The chance that Blade may not revert to his vampire origins not only lurks in the background but also enhances the suspense. This element of uncertainty generates anxiety and endows the protagonist with an Achilles' heel that makes him seem more believable and charismatic. Blade cruises around in a 1968 Dodge Charger that looks very cool despite its late model make.

Legendary vampire hunter Abraham Whistler (a grouchy Kris Kristofferson with a gimpy leg) found Blade as a juvenile roaming the streets and living off the blood of derelicts. Transforming Blade into a super hero with injections of a blood substitute, he serves as Blade's stepfather and ordnance maker. Surprisingly, Whistler lasts longer than most sacrificial characters. Loosely modeled on the Roman god Vulcan who forged weapons for the deities, Whistler trains Blade to slay vampires with extreme prejudice. Blade approaches his crusade with the enthusiasm that Charles Bronson mustered for killing muggers in the quintet of "Death Wish" movies. Not surprisingly, more than enough vampires survive from other parts of the world for Blade to combat in the sequels. Wow, does "Blade" ever leave itself wide open in its wrap-up in Russia for a sequel! Anyhow, the vampires in "Blade" are not tooth fairies. Organized into a powerful, global underground syndicate, Dragonetti (Udo Kier) presides over them as a Corleonesque godfather. The scene in the shadowy conference room with vampires dressed in suits is effectively creepy. Kier's Dragonetti is a pure-blooded fangster in a world of full and half-blooded vampires.

In "Blade," the cities of the world have been practically undermined by vampires. Vampires have gained leverage in the business and politician arenas. These vampires own the police so they control the law. As the snotty, upstart Deacon Frost, actor Stephen Dorff plays the half-breed vampire who Dragonetti turned. Frost harbors greater ambitions than Dragonetti. The elder vampire prefers to co-exist with mortals and abide by their treaties. Frost demands that the vampires dominate humanity. Secretly, Frost has been translating the ancient vampire text, The Book of Erebus, which will enable him to resurrect vampire blood god La Magra. Frost wants to revive this demon, but he needs the missing link: Blade's blood. Frost calls Blade "day-walker," because the vampire bible has prophesied Blade's unique genetic make-up. If he can revive this blood god, Frost can control the House of Erebus that rules the undead, and vampires can emerge as the dominant force in the world. The splashy finale in a phantasmagoric vampire temple with skeletons bursting out of the mouths of vampires in a storm of jagged lightning bolts owes a little to "The Fifth Element" as well as "The 7th Voyage of Sinbad" (1958), but this scene is fully and logically integrated in Goyer's script.

Sure, "Blade" amounts to nothing more than bloody pulp fiction. Nevertheless, Goyer and Norrington have reinvented vampire thrillers. "Blade" is entertaining, somewhat cheesy, but technically proficient hokum done with considerable technical prowess. Congratulations Stan Lee!

FILM REVIEW OF ''ONE-EYED JACKS" (1961)

Academy Award Winning actor Marlon Brando directed one movie during his prestigious 50-year career in Hollywood. Brando's Pennebaker Productions decided that a western might be a worthwhile investment since westerns had been profitable during the 1950s. The company shelled out $40,000 for the rights to author Charles Neider’s seminal western novel “The Authentic Death of Hendry Jones” and several scenarists came and went before “One-Eyed Jacks” (***1/2 out of ****) was completed. Among the scenarists were a young Sam Peckinpah, but novelist Calder Willingham replaced Peckinpah. This amoral western melodrama dealt with the themes of friendship, greed, deception, betrayal, and revenge. The troubled production history of this splendid horse opera casts a shadow over its artistry. First, Brando created several legends about his use of six or more takes for a scene. Second, the story goes that the star waited for the most dramatic waves to break on the shore. Brando toiled for six months on “One-Eyed Jacks.” Initially, “Paths of Glory” helmer Stanley Kubrick started out as the director. Artistic differences arose between Brando and Kubrick that prompted Kubrick’s dismissal. Reportedly, Kubrick preferred Spencer Tracy over Karl Malden as the villainous Dad Longworth. Brando objected on the basis, however, that Pennebaker Productions had already paid Malden the sum of $300-thousand. Afterward, when nobody stepped forward to helm the film, Brando decided he would try. Paramount executives should have had their heads examined for letting a temperamental actor like Brando call the shots on a film.

Three American outlaws, Rio (Marlon Brando of “Julius Caesar”), Dad Longworth (Karl Malden of “Baby Doll”), and Doc (perennial character actor Hank Worden of “Red River”) hold up a Mexican bank. Dad and Doc ride off to shack up with prostitutes in a bordello, while Rio heads off to romance a refined lady at her hacienda. Mexican Rurale captain (Rodolfo Acosta of “Hondo”) leads a posse to the bordello and they kill Doc when they raid the place. Dad slips out by the window with his gun, but he forgets his boots. Dad rides off to alert Rio. Together they light out into desert with the Rurales on their trail. Rio loses his horse and has to double up on Dad’s mount. They take refuge on a hill and exchange gunfire with the Rurales. Our heroes decide that one of them must round up fresh horses so they can escape from the Rurales. Rio draws two bullets and grips them in his fist. Interestingly, our protagonist lets Dad win and Dad sets out for fresh horses while Rio holds up the Rurales. Dad rides into a tiny ranch and buys a horse. He is shifting the gold coins around in his fist when he decides to leave Rio to the Rurales. Eventually, the Rurales surround Rio and he surrenders. He spends the next five years in a stinking Sonora Prison, while Dad lives high off the hog in Monterey, California, where he has gotten himself elected sheriff. Moreover, Dad has married Maria (Katy Jurado of “High Noon”) and adopted Maria’s daughter, Louisa (Pina Pellicer of “Macario”) as his own. He owns a house about 10 miles out of town.

Rio and Chico Modesto (Larry Duran of “Viva Zapata!”) break out of the Sonora Prison. They are in a cantina when Bob Amory (Ben Johnson of “Rio Grande”) approaches Rio about robbing a bank in Monterey. Rio learns Dad Longworth is the town lawman. Rio visits Dad before Amory and his sidekick, Harvey Johnson (Sam Gilman of “The Young Lions”), show up in Monterey. Initially, Dad believes Rio has come to kill him for double-crossing him back in Sonora. Rio doesn’t want to shoot Dad. Rio explains he gave the Rurales the slip and eluded them. Dad introduces Rio to his family and Louisa takes an immediate interest in him. Later, Rio guns down a drunken man in a Monterey bar, Howard Tetley (Timothy Carey of “The Killing”), who was abusing a helpless woman. Dad has had enough of Rio. Primarily, Dad is angry because Louisa spent the night on the beach with Rio. Dad’s sleazy Deputy Lon Dedrick (Slim Pickens of “Rocky Mountain”) has had his eye on Louisa and hates Rio. Dad arrests Rio for killing Tetley. Disarming Rio, Dad lashes his wrists to a horse’s hitching rack. Wielding a bullwhip on Rio, Dad sends him to his knees. Dad reverses a shotgun and smashes the butt of the weapon against Rio’s right hand to destroy his hand.

Rio and company flee Monterey, but our protagonist is even more determined to kill Dad. Rio recuperates on the beach and gets back the use of his gun hand. Bob and company ride into town to rob the bank. The robbery is a bust, but a little girl dies during the shoot-out. Rio is riding back to town when Dad’s deputies arrest him. Although Rio had no part in the robbery, Dad locks him up and prepares the gallows for his inevitable hanging. Louisa tries to smuggle a derringer into Rio by hiding it in a bowl of soup, but Lon discovers the firearm. He escorts Louisa from the jail and Rio smashes up his bunk for a piece of wood attached to a strap thathe can use to sling out at the table in front of his cell. Lon has forgotten about the derringer and left it on the table. Brando generates some great suspense as Rio repeatedly tries to get the derringer. At the same time that Rio is trying to get the derringer, Dad is taking a liesurely ride along the beach back into town. Rio bluffs Lon with the derringer when he returns. What Lon doesn't know is that the derringer contains no bullets. Rio escapes from jail and shoots it out in the town plaza with Dad. They confront each other with a water fountain between them and Rio slips around behind Dad and shoots him in the back. After he rides out of town, Rio and Louisa rein up and discuss their future together. Rio must clear out of the territory, but he plans to return in the spring when Louisa gives birth to his child.

The striking locales set “One-Eyed Jacks” apart from most westerns. When Brando left the production, he had filmed about five hours of footage and assembled his own cut. Paramount whittled the unwieldy opus down to two hours and forty-one minutes. Interestingly, the title refers to the two sides of a jack rabbit's face. Rio brags that he knows who the real Dad is and he isn't the man who duped the town of Monterey. Financial woes aside, “One-Eyed Jacks” qualifies a good, often compelling western about two bad men who clash at the outset over stolen gold. One lands in a filthy Sonora prison, while the other one ends up in California with a badge on his chest. The cast is stupendous, particularly Malden who plays a thoroughly treacherous dastard. Ben Johnson, Slim Pickens, Katy Jurado, Timothy Carey, and Pina Pellicer all contribute memorable performances, but it is “The Magnificent Seven” lenser Charles Lang who makes the scenic Monterey coast with his crashing surf and the rugged Mexican locations look absolutely dazzling. Unfortunately, the studio shots involving back projection detract from Lang’s visual real-world composition. Indeed, Brando himself received a nomination for Best Director. Sadly, “One-Eyed Jacks” never recouped its negative cost, the amount that it took to produce this exotic western.

FILM REVIEW OF ''THE A-TEAM'' (2010)

Anybody who enjoyed the landmark NBC-TV action series “The A-Team” will probably want to see new big-screen adaptation. “Smokin’ Aces” director Joe Carnahan and scenarists Skip Woods and Brian Bloom have adhered to both the spirit and formula of the George Peppard classic. Our original heroes were elusive, but wrongly-convicted government fugitives on the lam, one jump ahead of military authorities, and the film “The A-Team” sticks to that premise like glue. Although the series that co-starred Mr. T was set against Vietnam, Carnahan and his scribes have updated the storyline so the action occurs in Iraq. Since more than twenty years has elapsed since the series left the air, Twentieth Century Fox must have decided that the movie do double-duty as an origins outing rather than a sequel. After all, contemporary audiences probably weren’t watching television when the original series aired from 1983 to 1987. Liam Neeson of “Taken” quite capably takes over the role that George Peppard originated. Bradley Cooper of “The Hangover” steps easily into Dirk Benedict’s shoes as ‘Faceman.’ Newbie Sharlto Copley of “District 9” is every bit as loony tunes as Dwight Schultz was as the harebrained Murdock. Finally, Quinton 'Rampage' Jackson plays ghetto-tough B.A. Baracus, the role that made Laurence Tureaud into an overnight sensation as Mr. T. Essentially, “The A-Team” (**** out of ****) qualifies as a prequel to the television series. The filmmakers show how the eponymous foursome met and wound up in the dire predicament that led to their weekly exploits.

“The A-Team” concerns honor, deception, betrayal, lies, and revenge. Colonel Hannibal Smith, a U.S. Army Ranger, is getting the pulp smashed out of him as the action unfolds in gritty Mexico. A corrupt Mexican policeman laughs at Hannibal because our hero handed over a bundle of greenbacks to a dirty cop. They cannot get Hannibal to cough up anything but blood, so they decide to ice him. They try to kill him with his own pistol, but Hannibal has removed the firing pin, and the corrupt cop doesn’t want his henchman to shoot him with his own gun because he fears that U.S. authorities will trace the killing back to them. They leave Hannibal with his impaired firearm and turn two vicious dogs loose on him. Before the dogs can reach him, Hannibal reassembles his weapon and his waiting for the mutts. Meanwhile, Lieutenant Templeton ‘Faceman’ Peck is tied up and stuck in the middle of several tires while a higher corrupt cop, General Javier Tuco (Yul Vazquez of "American Gangster") wants to know who the pretty boy is working for. They plan to strung Peck up, and General Tuco is furious because Faceman had sex with his wife. B.A. Baracus is cruising through the countryside in his signature black mini-van when he happens upon an escaped Hannibal. They share U.S. Ranger tattoos and bond, after Hannibal pumps a slug into him. Just as the villains are about to hang Peck, Hannibal and B.A. arrive like the cavalry in the nick of time. Afterward, our heroes grip each other’s hands and set off to a hospital to pick up Murdock. The angry Tuco masses his forces and retaliates with greater firepower. Our protagonists spring Murdock from the hospital, and he flies them out in a Red Cross helicopter, only to discover that another chopper armed with missiles is pursuing them. Murdock performs some aerodynamically impossible stunts to elude the missiles. This entire, prolonged, bullet-riddled, action-packed sequence with the main credit titles popping up occasionally against the scenery and the gunfire resembles the pre-credit sequence from a James Bond escapade. Carnahan never lets the action stall for a moment and he adopts a storytelling strategy that keeps audiences up to snuff with the “A-Team’s” shenanigans. Basically, Carnahan lets the characters explain what they plan to do and shows them carrying out the plan as they explain it. The recent "Sherlock Holmes" movie did the same thing.

The story lunges ahead eight years into the future after our heroes have completed 80 missions. The setting is Iraq after the war has concluded. Hannibal and his men are considered the best special operations unit in the U.S. military. Hannibal has caught wind of a hush-hush, top-secret operation that he feels only his elite quartet can handle. It seems that terrorists in Baghdad have obtained stolen U.S. Mint printing plates and have run off over $1 billion worth of $100 bills. The bigger diplomatic picture prohibits Hannibal’s oldest friend, General Morrison (Gerald McRaney of CBS-TV’s “Simon & Simon”), from issuing Hannibal official orders to recover both the plates and the money. Instead, Morrison appears to have struck a deal with a ruthless band of mercenaries called Black Forest, led by Pike (Brian Bloom of “Terminal”), who have no qualms about murder as long as they are paid in full. Meantime, our heroes go in, snatch the plates and a trailer-load of counterfeit currency. All too suddenly, everything goes south for Hannibal and his team. An explosion obliterates the trailer, and Morrison dies in another explosion himself. Our heroes are arrested for disobeying orders. Everybody, including one of Peck’s ex-girlfriends, Captain Charisa Sosa (sexy Jessica Biel of “Stealth”), believes that Hannibal’s team and Pike’s gunmen collaborated on the mission. The Army court-martials the quartet and sends them off to serve stretches in different prisons. Hannibal refuses to accept this miscarriage of justice and finds himself an ally in Lynch (Patrick Wilson of "Watchmen") a mysterious C.I.A. agent. Although he is incarcerated in a top military lock-up, Hannibal has been cooking up a plan when he meets with Lynch. In no time at all, our heroes escape from prison and go after Pike.

Hollywood has struggled without success to resurrect other televisions series, but they have failed more often than not and failed miserably. “Starsky and Hutch,” “Wild Wild West,” “I Spy,” “The Avengers,” and “The Mod Squad” were catastrophes. Happily, “The A-Team” is a straightforward, larger-than-life, high-octane, action movie that never wears out its welcome. Moreover, “The A-Team” is better than its predecessor. Predictable for the most part, it is nevertheless an amusing as well as absorbing, with terrific performances, snappy dialogue, and a sense of audacity. The biggest differences between the PG-13 rated “A-Team” and the original series is that people die, and the big-screen adaptation adopts a grittier approach. Of course, “The A-Team” is just another big, noisy, slam-bang actioneers, but these Carnahan and company know how to slam and bang! They haven’t overlooked anything in terms of hardware so “The A-Team” looks as slick and sophisticated as a James Bond extravaganza. They have also jammed in enough intrigue for a Jason Bourne thriller. This explosive adventure opus has crowd pleaser branded on it with its international locations, high voltage action sequences, and murderous villains.