Shoot 'Em Up - A Biased Movie Review

Shoot 'Em Up
written and directed by Michael Davis
Opens on Sept. 7th in the US and Canada

If you've been reading my blog, you may have already guessed that I have tended to shamelessly promote this movie since there is some connection between Shoot 'Em Up and the origins of this blog (and if you know me or are Linz in Texas (Hey!) you know how) so I'm saying straight up, this will be a slightly biased review.

Still, saying that, I will admit. The script is RETARDED (yes, I'm using that word and it is in no durogatory reflection of mental fitness state but as a childhood schoolyard reference at least until I get bombarded with nasty emails when I may think differently) and the dialogue is RETARDED. However, any dialogue coming out of the awesome mouth of Clive Owen's always sounds somehow more clever and purposeful and Owen saves the day within the movie and for the movie as well.

If you need to know the plot for Shoot 'Em Up and cannot tell that it's all within the title already, this movie is probably not for you. All you need to know is that Clive Owen plays a mysterious man who happens to be in the wrong place at the wrong time and witnesses a pregnant woman being shot at, and reluctantly tries to save her and the baby (oh and yes, we see the birth of the baby DURING the shoot out). The mother still dies but Owen's character, Smith, is forced to protect this baby who is being sought after by a crazed Paul Giamatti, relishing his role as the bad guy and eating every foul word Davis has given him. Smith enlists Monica Belucci's smarter-than-your-average-hooker for help (her scripted character name was DQ but it was never actually uttered in the final cut of the film, I guess they thought Dairy Queen might object?) but the rest of the movie continues along in shoot out sequence after shoot out sequences. Merchant-Ivory, this is not.

Still, in the over-the-top cartoonish plot with ridiculous action scenes, it was fun watching the rugged Clive Owen battle a ruffled Paul Giamatti and seductive Monica Belucci at the side throwing her accented barbed lines for good measure. It's like a down and dirty poor man's James Bond if the Looney Tunes people directed it, with a slightly more adult version (or actually horny teenaged boy vision, there's even a shoot out DURING the love scene).

Silly and slightly a bit too gruesome and bloody for my tastes, but Shoot 'Em Up is more fun than I thought it would be, mostly from a dizzying pace and watching great actors hamming it up. I could roll my eyes at the gratuitous violence and even MORE at the final anti-gun message but I think that's partly the point so I'm not going to even get into a tivvy about it.

Shoot 'Em Up = really a B but I'm going to give it a B+ while I'm being biased about it all. 8/10