Contraband - (January 13, 2012): R
Distributor: Universal Pictures
Opening Weekend Box Office: #1 with $24,500,000
Domestic Box Office Gross to-date: $28,800,000
Gross Revenue: $30,300,000
Production Budget: $25 million
Director: Baltasar Kormákur
Normally, after the crowded box office and the high-quality offerings of The Holiday Movie Season, moviegoers usually have to tolerate a string of decidedly mediocre titles as the New Year gains momentum, but by all appearances, it looked like Contraband would be primed to break that trend. A remake of a 2009 Icelandic film, this newest thriller seemed to promise everything that fans love about Hollywood everyman Mark Wahlberg, namely guns, violence, and unmatched criminal planning and precision. Based on Wahlberg’s reputation alone, Universal would have little trouble selling the film to audiences, but Contraband also boasted a surprisingly strong cast, especially since Kate Beckinsale’s legions of Underworld fans would jump at any opportunity to see her on the big screen. If there was one question mark, it was the inclusion of Icelandic director Baltasar Kormákur, who has no true proven success with American audiences and thus presented a bit of a gamble as the leader of a star-studded Hollywood blockbuster. Still, despite that one potential hiccup, I was enough of a fan of the talented cast and proposed subject-matter to be genuinely excited to see and review Contraband.
Taking viewers deep inside the world of professional smuggling, Contraband focuses on retired smuggler Chris Farraday (Mark Wahlberg), who has his peaceful life thrown into chaos when his inept brother-in-law, Andy (X-men: First Class’ Caleb Landry Jones), botches an important job. When Andy’s life is threatened by ruthless drug dealer Tim Briggs (Giovanni Ribisi), Chris assumes the debt and discovers that he has two weeks to come up with $700,000. Deciding that he has no other alternative but to return to a life of crime, Chris agrees to smuggle $10 million in counterfeit super-bills from Panama, leaving his best friend, Sebastian Abney (Ben Foster), to care for his family. However, an increasingly impatient Briggs assaults and threatens Chris’ wife, Kate (Kate Beckinsale), leaving Chris helpless to protect his loved ones while he tries to complete his operation. Dodging authorities, a corrupt ship captain (J.K. Simmons), and rival gangsters, Chris resolves to return home safely and punish those that have threatened to harm his family and have forced him back into a life of crime.
With such a loaded plot, Contraband had all the makings of a classic and thoroughly entertaining crime thriller, and there are points where the crime is genuinely exciting and some of the smuggling tricks are truly clever, but those moments are few and far in-between. As I said in the “Short and Sweet” review, viewers are fairly familiar with heist procedures, and yet heist films still take the time to carefully explain every trick…in the case of Contraband, viewers are thrown head-first into a complicated smuggling plot with little-to-no explanation. For easily the first hour of the film, it is downright difficult to understand what exactly is unfolding on-screen, and though most questions are answered by the time the end-credits roll, you are either left disappointed or have already lost interest. In terms of the plus-and-minus aspects of the cast, Wahlberg for the most part delivers the type of cinematic badass that we have come to expect over the years, but a portion of his performance feels forced, with his moments of “levity” being abrupt and downright corny. While the mix of positives and negatives that I just laid out may seem bad enough, the reality is that there are far worse offenses present within Contraband.
Easily the most abrupt and noticeable shortcoming of Contraband is its sloppy direction and cinematography, which would have you believe that you were watching a low-budget B-film as opposed to a Hollywood A-list action thriller. Cinematographer Barry Ackroyd tried to produce the same gritty and realistic feeling that he achieved in The Hurt Locker, but he completely missed the mark this time around, and together with director Baltasar Kormákur, the two produce enough blurred shots, erratic camerawork, and obscured angles to thoroughly piss-off the audiences that were led to believe that there would be some refinement to this film. Now, when I normally take the time to comment and criticize on the cast, it is usually to lay blame on poor acting, but this time around, I have to take a shot at a thoroughly questionable casting choice. Between Pearl Harbor, Van Helsing, and the Underworld series, Kate Beckinsale has made her career as a strong and thoroughly independent female powerhouse, but in Contraband, she is relegated to embodying a defenseless and rather dim-witted damsel-in-distress…talk about disappointing. Maybe my expectations for Mark Wahlberg’s work have been built-up a little too high, but I simply cannot overlook the considerably large amount of lazy and blatantly negative elements that were ultimately presented.
For as weak a project as Contraband ultimately is, audiences have yet to realize this horrible truth, so the inevitable effects of word-of-mouth will not be seen until the film’s second weekend. Wahlberg and Beckinsale proved that they still possess an undeniably strong draw, as this newest thriller smashed competition and took first place with nearly $25 million in its opening weekend. Thankfully, such a strong opening has already recovered the film’s modest production budget, so Universal cannot be that worried about sub-par critical reaction. Hopefully, January has gotten its misstep out of the way early and upcoming action entries like Underworld: Awakening, Haywire, and The Grey will be far more entertaining. Plain and simple, if you are a true Mark Wahlberg fan, you will be disappointed in Contraband, and if you feel absolutely compelled to still see the film, then you will be better off waiting for Netflix or Red Box.
Overall Recommendation: Low
