Man on a Ledge Review
The title pretty much describes the movie.
There’s a little more than that, of course. There is a motivation that seems to work, and the characters all seem to appeal. The story is griping enough and well done through the first 90%, but the whole thing falls apart into Inspector Clouseau style chaos at the end.
I guess it’s inevitable that even movies I enjoy these days seem to have flaws that irk me like a paper cut on the end of my tongue. 
This film has the appearance of a well packed cargo train, with everything tight, organized, and in it’s proper place, that at the last minute had a ton of extra luggage attached to the outside of the third car and a caboose full of clowns hitched up to the rear. There was a long, extended flashback scene in the first 20 minutes that felt completely out of place and in my opinion actually detracted from the story, and at the end, after 85 minutes of decent, coherent story telling the plot exploded like someone flushed a cherry bomb down it’s toilet. All of a sudden the pacing gets cranked up to ramming speed and a the plot threads start flying all over the screen like someone fed crystal meth to a nest of psychotic spiders.
(Train image courtesy of the Funny T Shirt category)
On the other hand, this movie features the hottest woman in the history of the human race, Genesis Rodriguez. It frustrates me that women like this exist and don’t want to talk to me. The only thing that could make it more painful was if I found out her name was not a Biblical reference her parents saddled her but a screen name she chose from the Genesis project from TWOK. I think I would be out on a ledge at that point.
The story is, of course, about a man on a ledge. Sam Worthington (Avatar, Clash of the Titans, Terminator Salvation) crawls out on a ledge and starts threatening to kill himself. A crowd gathers. He request a specific police negotiator, discredited Detective Lydia Mercer (Elizabeth Banks-Spiderman, the 40 Year Old Virgin, the Next Three Days). At that point we get into the flashback that in retrospect bugged me so much. It basically details how Sams character Nick Cassidy was an ex cop convicted of stealing a gigantic diamond from the bad guy David Englander (Ed Harris-A Beautiful Mind, the Abyss, the Rock) and how he escaped from prison and ended up in this hotel. First of all this whole sequence felt really out of place, but more importantly I think the story would have gone a lot better if we had discovered these things as the police did. Add an element of mystery to the whole thing.
Anyway, he is motivated to prove his innocence, and while he is distracting everyone his friends, including the aforementioned Genesis Rodriguez (Prisionera, Doña Bárbara) and his brother (Jamie Bell-Jumper, the Adventures of Tintin, Billy Elliot). Somehow they have become expert cat burglars and safe crackers with no experience whatsoever. Whatever. So the plan is based entirely on Nick distracting people at the right moments in order to give his team the time they need. Stuff blows up. Genesis strips down to her underwear and slithers into a body stocking in the most gratuitous and appreciated scene (from me) in cinema history. I don’t want to give the ending away, but all of a sudden the story takes every freeway off ramp simultaneously and then ends up in a multi car crash at the denouement (this is a word I just learned a few minutes ago. Me so smart).
Anyway, the stars. While not terribly original, it was an interesting twist on a crime story. One star. Acting was decent from Sam Worthington and the rest of the cast. One star. In spite of spending the entire time on a ledge, there were definitely parts that were exciting. One star. Genesis Rodriguez. One star. I do enjoy a good crime story, with the burglars having to defeat each of the security systems in turn. One star. I thought Ed Harris did an admirable job as the villain. He seemed a little over the top and out of place at times, but really gave you someone to hate. One star. I thought direction and camera work managed to give a definite sense of vertigo. Well done IMO. One star. Generally a good film that didn’t make me think I had wasted my money. One star. Total: eight stars.
The black holes. An ending that can best be described as a clusterf***. Two black holes. The early on out of place and unnecessary flashback. One black hole. Total: three black holes.
In the irksome but not black hole worthy category, I have a couple. The idea of Nick’s compatriots somehow having the skills need to defeat a multi million dollar security system is laughable, but since it gave a lot of screen time to my dream woman I can’t complain too much. Also, after an entire movie of sneaking through vent shafts and tricking cameras the final stage of the security system is defeated by opening up a thermostat control box and clipping a single wire. It’s like they paid their security systems consultant but ran out of budget for the last 25 minutes.
So a grand total of 5 stars. A decent score for a decent movie. I think you would enjoy seeing this on a big screen. The sense of danger the vertigo gives you will probably be lost on a TV. I think this would make a decent date movie too. There is some emotional stuff going on, and a couple of decent female characters. Nothing uber creepy that might put her off the idea of intimacy if you know what I mean. Good luck.
Three movies in three days and I am kind of movied out. I will take a break for a day or two. I have some thoughts on the Academy Awards Nominations (mostly around God awful Tree of Life getting nominated for anything other than going out and getting beer for all the other movies) and might do something on that tomorrow. Thanks for reading. Follow me on Twitter @NerdKungFu. Talk to you soon.
Dave
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