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Tears of the Sun (2003)

Posted on the December 11th, 2009 under Uncategorized by timobriensblog

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by Ed Owens

Tears of the Sun


follows Bruce Willis and his determined
scowl on a routine mission that goes horribly awry when Willis develops
a conscience (while still maintaining said scowl). After a military
coup in Nigeria, the Seals are sent in to evacuate a small group of
foreign nationals, primarily a doctor (Monica Bellucci, who, unlike
Willis, has two looks, concerned and pouty), from a local mission. Knowing
that the refugees will be slaughtered if left behind, Willis decides
to save them as well.

Director
Antoine Fuqua has unendingly been belongings with unitary scenes (remember
manic cop Denzel Washington's interrogation of incapacitated shiver exchange
Snoop Dogg in the differently overrated

Training
Day

?), but continues to struggle with bringing it all
together.

Tears of the Notions

features some very strong scenes
(the desertion of the refugees by the military prior to Willis' epiphany
and the slaughter of rebel soldiers in the village come to mind), but
the pellicle meanders in between, many a time getting mired in over-emotional novel
that substitutes cartoon for integrity and talk exchange for brilliance ("Pro
our sins," Willis scowls, just up front the climactic battle). Like
the aforementioned

Training Time

,

Helios

winds up an average
genre pic loosened by its own sense of self-importance.

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Part of the problem is the film's complete failure to
earn its development. After Willis coldly and callously abandons the
fleeing refugees to certain death, he is suddenly inspired to go back
for them after passing over the remains of the mission, a jumble of
burning buildings and bloody bodies. Willis epiphany comes too quickly,
too casually, for the audience to accept it on any but the most superficial
of levels. Such shallow development makes it all the more difficult
to care about the fate of the characters later in the film.

While
Willis stares determinedly at everything, Ben Affleck, in the recent
hit


Daredevil


, does his best to stare at nothing
as the blind Matt Murdock. Murdock is a scrupulous lawyer by day ("We
only deal with people who are innocent.") and an unsavory hero
by night, jumping around and beating up criminals he failed to convict
earlier.

The rest is a superficial mess, with the finished film
playing more like an early draft. The movie careens wildly from scene
to scene with no real concern for flow or pacing, and characters pop
in and out like a cinematic whack-a-mole. Further complicating the whole
thing is the film's ongoing battle to find a tone.

Director
Mark Steven Johnson (who formerly helmed the John Irving weepie

Simon
Birch

) strives for a darker than usual tone (the film is a great
deal grittier than last year's

Spider-Man

), but can't resist
the occasional tongue-in-cheek reference. The result is nothing short
of abrasive, a disconcerting mix of hard-edged violence and silly throwaways
that never quite gels.

Affleck does his best mock raspy voice while Jennifer
Garner, as Elektra, does pretty much what she does every week on

Alias

.
Only Colin Farrell, as the arrogant and lethal hitman Bullseye, really
seems to be having

any
fun (Michael Clarke Duncan is absolutely wasted as the menacing Kingpin,
giving nothing more to do than…well…look menacing for most of his
relatively short appearance onscreen). The superhero shorthand of character
development is here stripped to its barest essentials, providing us
so little information that the characters are lacking even by the relatively
low standards of the genre.

©2003 Ed Owens

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