[Screen It]

 

"THE NEXT THREE DAYS"
(2010) (Russell Crowe, Elizabeth Banks) (PG-13)

If you've come from our parental review of this film and wish to return to it, simply click on your browser's BACK button.
Otherwise, use the following link to read our complete Parental Review of this film.

QUICK TAKE:
Drama/Suspense: A desperate husband comes up with an elaborate but dangerous plan to spring his wife from jail for a murder he knows she didn't commit.
PLOT:
John Brennan (RUSSELL CROWE) is an English professor and family man, happily married to businesswoman Laura (ELIZABETH BANKS) and proud and caring father to their young son Luke (TY SIMPKINS). The morning after a night out with friends, however, their life together is turned upside down when Laura is unexpectedly arrested for the murder of her boss. With all of the available evidence pointing at her, she ends up convicted and imprisoned for the crime.

That puts a great deal of strain on John as he tries to continue raising Luke as normally as possible, but with the boy shunning his mother in prison and following her suicide attempt, he's desperate for a solution. He thinks he finds it in a convict (LIAM NEESON) who's escaped from the joint numerous times and gives John various pointers about what's necessary to pull off such an act.

Anytime he's not with Luke, or when the boy is off with his grandparents, George (BRIAN DENNEHY) and Grace (HELEN CAREY), or at a birthday party thrown by the parent, Nicole (OLIVIA WILDE), of one of Luke's classmates, John is plotting his course of action, including doing recon at the prison, trying to get fake passports and such.

As he prepares and then sets his plan into motion -- even surprising Laura with it upon springing it on her -- John must contend with various expected and unexpected developments, including the likes of cops Det. Quinn (JASON BEGHE) and Lt. Nabulsi (LENNIE JAMES) ending up on his trail, determined to prevent him from leaving Pittsburg and fleeing to another country.

OUR TAKE: 4 out of 10
Everyone (or at least those who follow the movie biz) knows that Hollywood operates in cycles, where somewhat to vary similar films are released just a few weeks or months apart (think of the body-switching movies of the 1980s and the "big rock is headed for Earth" ones from the '90s). That's often due to the same spec script being seen at various competing studios that, conveniently, already had something similar in the works. I don't know if that's the case this fall, but it sure seems peculiar that we've had not one and not two, but three "get your family member" out of jail flicks in the span of just a few weeks.

First up was "Stone," where Milla Jovovich's character slept with Robert De Niro's parole officer one in order to sway him to release her husband played by Edward Norton. Then we had "Conviction," the true-life story of Betty Anne Waters (played by Hilary Swank) who spent 18 years going back to school to become a lawyer and thus try to get her brother's (Sam Rockwell) murder conviction overturned.

One was a bit hokey and the other lacking the proper emotion to make it jump off the screen, but they seem like models of seriousness and empathy in comparison to "The Next Three Days," the last part of the unofficial "get out of jail" trilogy. Designed as a simple thriller but apparently throwing some critics (and thus the releasing studio) for a loop as they apparently expected something with a bit more gravitas considering its writer/director and star are often associated with Oscar winning work, the film has any number of problems that bedevil it.

A remake of the 2008 French thriller "Pour elle" ("Anything for Her"), the film garners laughs when nothing purposefully funny is occurring, appears to take place in an alternate reality where the usual rules don't apply, and doesn't really get going until the third act. I've said it before and I'm sure I'll say it again, but any film, regardless of whether it's sci-fi, historical drama or romantic comedy, has to behave in accordance with the rules of its particular universe. Thus, we can readily accept things that happen in "Star Wars" that wouldn't go over in "The Godfather" or "When Harry Met Sally."

Here, we start with the completely unnecessary glimpse of what's yet to come -- our hero (Russell Crowe), hurriedly driving a wounded man in his car and then apparently watching him die. Okay, it's not the first film and won't be the last to offer such a teaser, but things then rush along back at the "beginning." Following a night out with other couples, the protagonist's wife (Elizabeth Banks) finds blood on her coat and is trying to wash it out just as cops burst in and arrest her for murder. As the Church Lady used to say on Saturday Night Live, "How convenient."

We're then whisked past the trial and early prison term to the point that the couple's young son (Ty Simpkins) doesn't want anything to do with his mother. That's followed by their attorney -- and the next sign that things aren't right in this universe -- played by Daniel "Home Alone City Slickers" Stern -- informing him she'll never get out. With that in mind, and following the dear wife's obligatory in-prison suicide attempt, our resourceful hero decides not to sleep with the parole officer or become a lawyer to overturn her conviction. Instead, he sets out to find a role model to figure out how to break her out of the joint.

Faster than you can say "Google Maps" he clandestinely meets such a man (Liam Neeson in just a one-scene extended cameo) who, for reasons unknown, can not only be found but is also somehow free after admitting he turned himself following seven (yes, 7) successful prison breaks. Methinks after two or three they probably don't let you out again, but he's necessary for the plot to move forward (although a marathon of watching prison break movies probably would have sufficed). And that's because he lets the protagonist know (and thus prepares us as well) that he must be ready to do whatever it takes. Meaning the unimaginable. The unthinkable. The unbelievable.

Oops, that was me with the last one, although many audience members will probably feel the same way about how writer/director Paul Haggis ("Crash") has conceived and attempted to execute his cinematic plan. Some of the conveniences, illogical moments and more could have been fixed with some simple script tweaks, but I'm not sure that could have turned around the first two acts that simply build up too much incredulousness for the rest of the film to make it.

I'll admit that once the break has occurred and the chase begins in the third act, the related action, suspense and such are decently handled, even if additional "What?" "Huh?" and "I don't think so" moments keep popping up along the way (including material involving some obligatory, pursuing cop figures). And since it's hard for anyone to buy into what's transpiring, it's similarly difficult to fully care (or even anything more than superficially, by default) about the characters, their plight, goals and/or complications along the way.

All of which leaves the mind time to ponder what the fourth "get out of jail" installment might entail. Perhaps the convicted will be beamed out via a transporter, or maybe they'll receive a "Get out of jail" free game board card. If that occurs within the confines of the next "Star Trek" flick or "Monopoly: The Movie," we'll probably accept it to one degree or another. Sadly, what's offered here is more likely to elicit guffaws, eye-rolling or walking out rather than rooting for the protagonist to succeed. "The Next Three Days" rates as just a 4 out of 10.




Reviewed October 12, 2010 / Posted November 19, 2010


Privacy Statement and Terms of Use and Disclaimer
By entering this site you acknowledge to having read and agreed to the above conditions.

All Rights Reserved,
©1996-2023 Screen It, Inc.