Ever have one of those experiences where things are clicking right along? For instance you are on a great Sunday morning ride along US 1, north of San Francisco. The engine is humming, the pavement is great, the sky is wonderful, and the CHP has taken the day off. Oh maybe there's an occasional gray cloud and a drop of rain, so it's not absolute nirvana, but it is still fun. Ever been there? Of course you have. Now put yourself there and think of what it feels like when it all all goes straight to hell.
That's what watching Shoot 'Em Up was like.
At the beginning this movie was silly grand fun. You knew from the get-go that this was going to be a silly movie but that Clive Owen would make sure it was a good time. Owen is Mr. Smith, a man who is a crack shot under any circumstance, from whatever pose he might strike or be pushed into. Hell, he's a great shot even with all his fingers broken. And he loves him his carrots, too.
He ends up with a baby that he feels compelled to protect. In this effort he recruits drop-dead gorgeous Monica Bellucci. This leads to another shoot out, which leads to another. They are being pursued by Paul Giamatti, a hitman with a nagging wife. This leads to another shoot out and another and...
You get the idea. The title advertises what the film is about and delivers in spades. The plot is thread-bare and, in many places, non-existent. You have to ignore a herd of inconsistencies that come along for the ride. Example: In the opening sequence shoot 'em up, Owen slides through an enormous puddle of crankcase oil. At the end of the fight, he's almost clean as a whistle, no sign of the black goo he just wallowed in. And please, just ignore the plot holes. Still, as expected, Owen just made it good times.
It's easy to think of Shoot 'Em Up as parody, or it would have been if writer-director Michael Davis had just a touch of talent. Just a skosh.Instead, he is all about the flash and move, and nothing about building a story. His idea of a story is to stop things cold and let one character lecture another. And it was these Moments of Meaning that doomed Shoot 'Em Up.
Up until then, I was having a good time. Yes, I felt my IQ dropping, but I that happens whenever I make a margarita. Besides, Owen and Bellucci, enough said. No, where the film killed it for me was when it tried to wedge a plot into the proceeding, that Moment of Meaning, one that involved a lecture about the evils of guns, the horror of the Second Amendment, and the saintly beauty of Democrats contrasted with the implied Satanic nature of Republicans.
You think I jest? After blasting a slew of guys into the afterlife, Owen turns to one of their survivors and sneers, "How's that Second Amendment working for you now?"
The baby is the artificially inseminated off-spring of a Democrat US Senator running for President of the United States on a strong anti-gun ticket. Naturally he must be stopped so the opposition — obviously Republicans, though never named as such — hatch the most cock-and-bull plot, all to defend their arms business.
Is their arms business about selling weapons for warring factions? No. Do they sell high caliber arsenals to drug lords? No. No, their arms business is selling ordinary guns to ordinary citizens. Oh, horrors!
I would love to believe that the producers reveled in the irony they were creating. "How's that Second Amendment working for you?" Well, Mr. Smith, for you it appears to be working pretty damn well. All those guys are chasing you with machine guns, a massive illustration of the assertion that "when guns are outlawed only outlaws will have guns."
But there's no indication that they understood this. No, they are way too sincere on this point and it trashes what was, until then, a decent little, er, shoot 'em up.
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