Owen Wilson usually makes any movie better, simply by showing up and
being Owen Wilson.
Take "Shanghai Noon," for example. His laid-back demeanor was
the perfect counterpoint to Jackie Chan's hyperkinetic energy, and he
added a layer of dry wit to Chan's charisma and choreography.
Same with "Zoolander." Wilson's hippy-dippy male model balanced
out the cluelessly high-strung, self-serious Ben Stiller, and provided
some serious laughs in a movie that could have been just an extended comedy
sketch.
In "Behind Enemy Lines," in which he played a Navy lieutenant
stranded in Bosnia, the faux-Woo moves looked a little forced. But you
still rooted for him to escape unharmed - simply because he was Owen Wilson.
But his easygoing likability is actually a liability in "The Big
Bounce."
The film is based on an early Elmore Leonard crime novel (which already
has been turned into a movie once, in 1969, starring Ryan O'Neal). Leonard's
language has a rich, recognizable clip that's an ill fit on Wilson; he
lacks the edge needed to match the cadence of the dialogue.
In "Get Shorty," an infinitely superior Leonard adaptation,
John Travolta was another cool customer, but he had a confidence and a
charisma burning beneath the surface that gave him the oomph required
in Leonard's writing.
Wilson, as drifter Jack Ryan (not to be confused with the Tom Clancy
character), seems as if he couldn't care less about the plan he's been
dragged into to steal $200,000 from sketchy real estate developer Ray
Ritchie (Gary Sinise). He could go surfing or he could rob a safe - it
doesn't really matter.
Another problem is that director George Armitage ("Grosse Pointe
Blank") and writer Sebastian Gutierrez ("Gothika") have
moved the book's location from Michigan to Hawaii, so the trademark low-down-dirty-thief
element of Leonard's work seems out of place in paradise.
And we're repeatedly reminded that we're in Hawaii; what must be 10 minutes
of the film's sparse 88-minute running time consist of cutaways and filler
of surfers riding gigantic waves in slow motion.
Giant chunks of time also are devoted to ogling Ray's scheming mistress
Nancy Hayes (Sara Foster) as she parades along the beach in a yellow string
bikini, or sunbathes nude, or manipulates Jack and every other man while
wearing some low-cut ensemble that could only be held together with double-sided
tape.
Nancy is supposed to be the mastermind behind the robbery, but in her
first film, Foster (a former model and daughter of songwriter David Foster)
simply has no there there. She's suitably sexy to play the femme fatale,
but just seems stiff and self-conscious.
Actors who know what they're doing, meanwhile, are squandered: Bebe Neuwirth
is relegated to playing a stereotype as Ray's miserable, rich, drunk wife,
and Charlie Sheen has sparse screen time (and a bad mustache) as Ray's
doofus flunkie.
Morgan Freeman, though, manages to muddle together his usual stately
presence as Jack's boss, a motel owner and part-time judge. And he takes
part in the movie's best scene in which he, Wilson, Willie Nelson and
Harry Dean Stanton sit around a table playing dominoes, drinking Wild
Turkey and making fun of each other.
More moments like that could make a movie worthy of Leonard's name.
