Movie Review: The Next Three Days

Next Three Days Movie Poster

Movie: The Next Three Days

Starring: Russell Crowe, Elizabeth Banks, Liam Neeson

Written & Directed By: Paul Haggis

  

The Next Three Days isn't your typical prison break action movie.  It wisely knows that we have seen those too many times  to be interested.  Instead it focuses more on the level of planning, commitment and mindset needed to pull off such a crime. Russell Crowe stars as John Brennan a community college English professor whose world is turned upside down after a night out with his wife Lara (Elizabeth Banks). In the middle of a seemingly normal breakfast the police rush in and charge his wife with the murder of her boss. The family is in shock but all the evidence points to her, she was the person last seen with the victim, her fingerprints were on the weapon and blood was found on her jacket. Lara is convicted of the murder. After three years of legal battles John finds he has run out of options. It is at this point that he becomes ever more determined to take control of his life by breaking her out of prison and escaping the country.

Unlike other prison break movies this movie doesn't focus so much on the action. Russell Crowe and writer/director Paul Haggis do a good job at making John believable as an average guy and not an action hero.

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Movie Review - The Tourist

Train Scene from The Tourist

The Tourist (Johnny Depp, Angelina Jolie, Paul Bettany. Directed by Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck


Angelina Jolie plays Elise, the girlfriend of a notorious thief named Alexander Pearce. Pearce stole billions of dollars from a ruthless casino owner named Shaw and disappeared, leaving Elise for two years. While in Paris, and being followed by police, she receives a note from Alex telling her to take a train and pretend that someone on it is him. This is supposed to serve simply as a distraction by drawing the police’s attention to an innocent bystander, but the plan gets out of hand when the tourist named Frank (Depp) is mistaken by Shaw as the real Pearce and hunted. Along the way, Elise tries her hardest to remove Frank from the fray.

The movie was panned by most critics for the lack of chemistry between Jolie and Depp but I really think they were expecting too much. They have just enough chemistry to make us believe these two people just met and are tentatively drawn to each other for various reasons. No, the screen doesn’t literally explode, but I really don’t think that is the point of the movie.

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