A Tale of Two Movies: 16 Blocks & Ultraviolet

Today is my birthday. Happy Birthday to me! To celebrate, my wife, my parents and I decided to hit the movies. Because of the special day, I got to chose. I picked 16 Blocks and UtraViolet. Granted, both movies are different thematically and stylistically, but you’d be harder pressed to find two more different films.

16 Blocks is an intense, original police thriller. Bruce Willis is back. He plays Jack Mosley, a washed up drunk of a cop and does so in a way that makes us forget his big-budget action hero work. Mos Def plays a small-time thief who found himself in the wrong place at the wrong time. Def plays the role with an accent reminiscent of Mike Tyson, yet it comes off as endearing rather than annoying. Director Richard Donner keeps you guessing in subtle, original ways. The film is equal parts action, emotion and suspense. It is the best police drama I’ve seen in ten years.

UltraViolet is a mess. Spun like a comic book adaptation, the film is not based on a comic. On the “let’s make a movie like a comic book” angle, it is a success. But in making a movie that truly looks like a comic book, they’ve proven why Bryan Singer was a genius for making the X-Men films look so "real". Making a film with a comic book pallette is hard on the eyes. Making a film with true comic book action & pacing will make the viewer nauseous. The first fifteen minutes of this movie prove all of these point beyond question. The rest of the film prove that comic book dialogue only really works in comic books.

So the casual reader makes no mistake, I love comic books. And, I love that so many great comic book franchises have made it to the big screen. Most of them, most notably Batman (minus Joel Schumacher), Spider-Man and the X-Men, have been done with great care and met with both critical and box office success. But the one thing all of these films had in common is their ability to place the fantastic in our world in a way that the viewer believes.

Ultraviolet is completely unbelievable. Even as a campy action-fest, it fails. Too bad, I really like Milla Jovovich and I’d hoped this film would return her to the rarified air of The Messenger and The Fifth Element (ironically enough … wilth Bruce Willis).