Firewall - (Fireball-Warz)

[Kaing of Kaings]

Fireballwarz...I mean Firewall is a generic thriller staring Harrison Ford as the good banker guy and Paul Bettany as the bad bank robber guy. The movie puts the audience in a situation like this...Bad guys come to your house and kidnap your dorky kids and your semi-wa-lady wife. They hold them ransom till you rob the bank where you work at. All of them work for the scary British Paul Bettany...But here is the Catch....You are a 64 year old guy who is about to play Indiana Jones for the fourth time...and yet you still act like you want to say "Your My Child" through the whole movie.

This is the premise of the movie. Harison Ford (getting too old for this shit) does an ok job but essentially plays the same role he did in Beat Force...I mean Air Force One, Clear and Flatulent Danger and Sabrina. I'm just kidding about Sabrina, I haven't seen that one. Anyway, the point is Harrison plays the guy whose wife and kids get kidnapped so now you are forced into Fear Factor situations.

Paul Bettany is one of Hollywood’s up and coming actors. I thought he was awesome in "Master and Commander, The Kang Side of the World" and I can't wait to see what he does as the evil Silas in this years "The Da Vinci Code” which is this years most anticipated movie for me.

Now lets talk about Jimmy, one of Paul’s thugs who help him hold the family hostage. Jimmy was my high school best friend who had a secret acting career I never knew about. He's been in many movies and has many faces. Lets review shall we. Here comes Jimmy One and he is my favorite Jimmy.



This is the Jimmy from Saving Private Ryan, That Thing You Do, Boiler Room, Captain Sky Dick and the Whore of Tomorrow, and Flight of the Jimmy.

Now there is this Jimmy,

Who was in That Thing You Do, Disturbing Behavior and Timeline

And now there is the new Jimmy,

He doesn't really look like Jimmy here because he grew his hair out. In the movie though, he shaved it which makes him the next incarnation of Jimmy. He plays one of the thugs.

Anyway, the movie also stars the pouty faced Mary Lynn Rajskub who always looks like she smells a fart. She got her start on the Mr Show with Bob and David.



Ok now for the review. Firewall isn't a bad movie...but it isn't great either. It is pretty much cookie cutter and you know what is going to happen next. There were a couple scenes where I laughed out loud when I wasn't like when one of the bad guys gets hit by a car and the car explodes for no apparent reason. There is also the Christian Rock Band praise the Jesus scene that was so funny that both my woman and I were laughing out loud. It wasn't supposed to be funny. However, this paint-by-numbers thriller is entertaining and doesn't really have any slow points. Some of the things are kind of cool too. Overall, I give this move 2.75 out of 4 stars. Let’s hope that Spielberg can make Harrison Ford a star again in Indiana Jones 4. It is going to be interesting to see what Senor Spielbergo does with that.



Harrison: "If you touch my child again...I'm going to say "YOU'RE MY CHILD" really loud so it will scare you into leaving. I will use my crusty scary face when I say it.

Paul: (Off Camera) "But Harrison, I'm not a Child.

Harrison: "You're MY CHILDDDDDDD."

-Pictures fixed by Stuboy-

[TheStuboy]

I just got back from seeing Fireballwarz and missing part of the Inside Man trailer. Traffic was horrible today and everyone else was a stu driver. Plus it didn't help that I was hitting every single red light on 700 E. Anyway, I finally got to my perferred theater, and saw Fireballwarz, not free like I'd hoped (more on that later).

(SPOILER ALERT)

Anyway, Harrison Ford's 64 year old age shows through here. He goes through the whole movie tired, and can't seem to become Indiana Jones anymore. One wonders if he is deffinitely too old for that film too?

Fireballwars begins with Harrison working at the Turtle-Pacific bank in rainy Seattle with big radio towers in the distance. There is so much rain in this film its a wonder any of it was shot. Or was this done intentionally, I think so.

Rain has little to do with the plot other than to keep the streets wet and create a real problem for aging Harrison, who, like wuss said, has crusty face throughout the entire movie. The very stu british bad guy played by Paul Heatanny, decides he wants to hack the Ubstudios mainframe and steal 5 cents from the google adsense account and he needs Harrison, who designed the system, to do it for him.
All the while his two stu kids and that lady from Sideways (Virginia Maddsen) are cooped up in their super duper mansion near Puget Sound. While there their every move is monitored by several worthless characters who eventually seem to die anyways for no apparent reason.

Harrison gets antsy though, and decides stuly to take matters into his own hands, all the while pissing off the T-1000 who repeats the car chase from Terminator 2 I might add.

So he builds this crappy thing that can scan images off a computer screen and upload them into a Gaypod, and it some how works, along with the amazing clarity of the picture he just took with his phone.

Paul Heattany decides he might be screwed and takes Harrison's dog and family out to the country somewhere northeast of Seattle to an abandoned farm house that just happens to be there.

Harrison remembers his dog has a manthabeat tracking device and uses his secretaries computer to find his dog, and thus, his family.
The final confrontation consists of Harrison showing his age and stiffness while beating up the much younger Heattany. Heattany eventually gets an axe pick to the back and corpses. What follows is a very lame ending.


END OF SPOILERS---


I have seen better action/suspense movies in my day, and I have seen better acting as well. While this wasn't a total bomb, it wasn't all that either. I think the fact that it took an hour to get going didn't help, and stu characters just interfered with the story.

Harrison Ford is noticably older, and the film makes light of it. In his stunt scenes, he is visibly slower and can't take falls into walls any more. He none-the-less is a great actor though, and will always be no matter how crappy the movie is.

Paul Bettany doesn't play all that convincing of a bad guy, except for when he corpses other people. The few moments when that happens are unexpected.

I almost thought the story was going to turn into something it didn't at first, and for the sake of worthlessness, I'm glad it stayed the course.

Firewall IS cookie cutter action and story, but its been given a technological boost (almost over done) and its enough to give this film 2.75 stars out of 4. Its not the greatest action movie, and at times it can be a bit slow, but its entertaining other than that.



"I'm gettin' too old for this shit"
"You forgot to say YOU'RE MY CHILD"


Oh yeah, there was no ticket on the KUTE desk for me to see this movie for free, oh well it was only $5.25 and worth it.