Guy Pearce Double Feature: Lockout (2012) and Lawless (2012)

There is almost something charming about how cliche the trailer of this movie is: The president's daughter has been kidnapped but there is one "loose cannon" crazy enough to try and save her. Every attractive young female needs to be put in distress and every B.A. renegade needs such motivation in order to take action, lest any display of actually caring puts his B.A. apathy credentials in question. Despite what is is, Guy Pearce plays his part convincingly, or at least in a way that kept me interested. He is paired with Maggie Grace of Taken fame, who also gets the job done.

For full disclosure, it's been over four months since I watched this movie, and it wasn't particularly memorable. The US president's daughter is visiting a prison colony in space and there is a breakout. In order to preserve his freedom, the state forces Snow (Pierce), a CIA agent, to go to the colony and rescue her. Snow agrees, and the bulk of the movie is him doing this as well as making a contact with an inmate who has information about a briefcase that proves Snow's innocence. There are some good action scenes, but overall I didn't find the film particularly engaging; why should I care about this woman? What's really at stake should Snow fail?

In the end, Lockout is a slightly above average sci-fi action movie that did its job of entertaining me during an international flight. I have no desire to watch it again, but just recall it with B.A.-like indifference.

Despite all of the big names in Lawless, I'm not sure the film has much content of artistic value. Its main accomplishment seems to be how skillfully it can show progressively escalating and increasingly shocking acts of violence. I suppose this helps tell story. But if there is anything of redeeming "social value" that this film has, I believe it is reminding us of the inevitable consequences of prohibition.

The economics of prohibition follow a predictable pattern. It leads to less competition among producers (or, more accurately, it encourages undesirable forms of competitiveness: instead of competition coming in the form of reducing prices or providing a higher quality product, it comes primarily in the form of who can best apply violence to maintain market share and settle disputes). Why? Because its black market nature cuts off access to legal forms of redress; you can't exactly resolve your dispute with your drug dealer in court. Also, since there is really no identifiable victim, law enforcement can much more easily turn a blind eye to it  (for a price) without much outcry. This is where Guy Pearce comes in. And he does a great job of making you hate him.

Local law enforcement doesn't have the power to stop the Bondurant family from selling moonshine, but why should they want to since they get a cut of the profits? Pierce comes into town as a federal law enforcement official and promptly demands a much higher take of the Bondurant's revenue. This leads to the aforementioned escalating acts of violence, until it meets an inevitable resolution. And that is an adequate summary of the movie.

There isn't much else beyond this besides watching Shia Labeouf and Tom Hardy attempt to woo various women. I just don't feel like it told much of a story and therefore would have a hard time recommending it.