A GAMER'S VIEW OF THE MOVIES

by Donald J. Bingle

Ransom

As promised, this month's review is of Ransom, Ron Howard's latest directorial offering starring Mel Gibson and Rene' Russo. This film is, in part, a remake of an old black and white flick of the same name, starring Glenn Ford, and, in part, an action/kidnap flick that Ron Howard was already beginning to work on before the updated Ransom screenplay crossed his desk. I bother to point that out only because the motivation of the main character and plot deviate a bit from what I remember of the old version of the movie (I tried to rent it, but Blockbuster didn't carry the old version). In the old version, Glenn Ford's character doesn't pay the ransom because he is told that there is no statistical difference in his chances of recovering his child, whether or not he pays--a pretty interesting statistic if it is true and an awfully good reason to take the Israeli-type point of view for dealing with terrorists (never deal, it just encourages future seizings) if you ever have a kidnapping situation (never deal, it doesn't affect the chances of seeing your loved one again, and it just increases the liklihood that some other person will face your predicament). In the new version of the film, the FBI is pretty adamant about paying the ransom, so the film has to go to some other lengths to explain why Mel Gibson's character eventually refuses to pay.

I say eventually, for a good part of the movie involves an initial attempt to pay the ransom. Because the movie audience knows from the early ads and trailers that there is eventually going to be a refusal to pay, they know the attempt to pay will fail, which takes some of the emotional steam out of what is really a pretty good action sequence and makes the movie seem a bit long or tedious in the middle section to some viewers. I am convinced that Ron Howard's people realized this after the first week or so of reviews and audience showings, because the commercials suddenly dropped any reference to the refusal to pay ransom.

Despite the improbability of the place, time, and nature of the initial snatching of the kidnap victim, I generally liked the movie because I think it treats the viewer with a fair amount of intelligence. There are some clever things, for example, in the ransom payoff attempt that you and/or the main character have to figure out, but the movie doesn't pander to the lowest common denominator by explaining everything to you like you are an idiot. Mel's character and his car are, of course, wired by the FBI before the payoff attempt begins. In following the kidnappers' instructions, Mel's character goes to the YMCA and is told to jump in the pool to retrieve a necessary key, but that his son will die if he removes any piece of clothing before jumping in the pool (occupied, for good fun, by bewildered children taking swimming lessons). It may look like the kidnapper is just making Mel jump through hoops to irritate him, but the dip in the pool fully clothed would also do a good job of assuring that his wire no longer functions. The key, to a car outside, takes care of the car's wire. There is some similar type stuff having to do with mobile conversations between the main character and the main kidnapper, but I won't further insult your intelligence by explaining everything that the movie makes clear, but doesn't explain, to an intelligent viewer.

One of the other delights of the film, from a gaming point of view, is watching the main kidnapper ad lib as events develop in the last portion of the movie. Anyone who has ever played Top Secret, for example, knows that at some point something bad happens to thwart even the best laid plans and that only an adept ad libber manages to control the situation as best he can. It would be easy to stand back and criticize some of the decisions and actions taken by the main kidnapper at this point as flawed or unlikely to protect him from eventual discovery, but when considered as quick judgments made in character in real time to make the most out of an increasingly bad situation, they are really quite interesting. In one scene, as the main kidnapper looks out of a cleaner's window as the plot goes awry in the alley outside, you can almost sense the wheels turning in his head to think of some way to stave off disaster, then quick, decisive action as his decision is made. Some critics have accused the movie of abrupt, inexplicable shifts in plot in the last portion of the movie, but I see it as the increasingly desperate and frantic thrashing about of a fish which feels itself hooked and being reeled in to the boat.