LOCKOUT

Lockout (2012)
Grade: C
Starring: Guy Pearce, Maggie Grace, Joseph Gilgun, Vincent Regan, Lennie James, Peter Stormare, Peter Hudson, and Tim Plester
PREMISE: When the inmates of a maximum-security prison riot and take over while the President’s daughter is aboard on a peacekeeping mission, the U.S. Government dispatches a rogue agent to bring her back and, if possible, wrest the station from control of the prisoners.

RATED PG-13 for language, violence, some bloody material and scary images

Lockout is unquestionably one of those movies that makes a great trailer. High-security prison in space + pretty, good-hearted president’s daughter (Maggie Grace of Taken fame) + prisoner takeover + (most importantly) quippy, muscle-bound rebel-without-a-cause (Guy Pearce) = cool premise and action galore. Sounds like a can’t-miss idea, right? Surprisingly for such an intriguing idea, Lockout barely succeeds. Mostly, its 95-minute running time plays like a trailer for a longer, more developed movie. The action scenes are quick and barely get the pulse racing, the dialogue is short, cute, and over with quickly, the emotion is half-baked and the romantic sparks are ambiguous, at best. Throw in a decidedly murky and unnecessary subplot, and Lockout sputters.

Plot: Snow (Pearce) has just been arrested for murder, espionage and scheming to bring down the U.S. Government. When he refuses to admit guilt-claiming someone else set him up and actually committed the key murder-plus showering his captors with cheap insults, Agent Langral (Peter Stormare) decides he’s earned himself a visit to the Big House. In this case, the Big House is MS-1, a space station/prison that orbits the earth. It’s still in its test phase, but, what with its ability to keep prisoners in cryo-sleep (and, therefore, under complete control at all times) it seems bound to be a big hit, and it has the capacity to hold over 500,000. However, Snow can’t even be transported there before the inmates take over. It happens when President Warnock’s daughter Emilie (Grace) is on board, trying to get an idea of the psychological state of people kept in cryo-sleep for years at a time—one of her aides sneaks in an extra gun, and, when he gets up close and personal with a prisoner (Joseph Gilgun) who’s being mouthy with the First Daughter, the gun is snatched. You can pretty much guess what happens from there. The prisoners are freed from cryo-sleep, swamp the prison guards, blast the warden out into space, injure the First Daughter and take her and her surviving aides hostage, and there seems to be nothing for the Government to do but blow it out of the sky. Of course, the president (Peter Hudson) isn’t about to let that happen while his daughter is on board. They send in Snow, hoping he can locate the First Daughter and get her to the hidden escape pod—once she’s freed, the decision to blow the station will be easy. But Snow is outnumbered, outgunned, and time is running out.

What Works?
Both leads deserve a better movie. Pearce (who should look familiar after appearing some of the past few decades’ most popular films: 1997’s L.A. Confidential, 2002’s The Count of Monte Cristo, 2009’s The King’s Speech) is smarter than the average muscle-head movie star, and this is an interesting change of pace for him. He has a lot of fun with his character’s rebellious, smart-mouth tendencies, and you can’t always tell exactly what he’s about to do. And, for a guy with a track record as a character actor, he’s surprisingly-convincing as a buff secret agent. Grace is solid, too, showing more brains than the average damsel-in-distress while navigating the emotional waters of chirpy smart girl, terrified hostage and mourner even before she gets to fit neatly into the opposites-attract dynamic with Pearce. They have surprisingly decent chemistry, and their snappy interplay is often quite funny.

What Doesn’t Work?
While you could argue that, even for an action flick like this, the two main characters making a solid impression counts as success, the movie itself isn’t all that good. It feels sorta empty, and it flies by. And that’s not to mention so much is left out—the movie jumps periods of time (including hours) in the blink of an eye, and fails to explain a lot of small but important details as it hustles. All this brought on-for me-an air of disbelief, as I couldn’t believe this was the real movie and not a simply a trailer or a sneak peek. And the subplot, involving Snow’s effort to prove his innocence by trying to find a fellow conspirator among the ship’s inmates, is distracting and rather phoned-in. It’s as if the filmmakers suddenly realized their movie was about 45 minutes long and needed more details. Newsflash: if your action film just has some more action-and maybe some more down time with your two talented leads-you don’t need to add extra plot lines.

Most of the other characters given significant screen time are just distracting. Lennie James and Peter Stormare are the requisite informed Government heavies, Peter Hudson is the deer-in-the-headlights president, and Joseph Gilgun and Vincent Regan are the two “leaders” of the inmates, a pair of Scottish brothers, the former of whom is completely insane and the latter is principled but merciless. Both actors are memorable but under developed.

And, in another big strike against an action movie like this, a key early chase scene is so frantically filmed that it’s almost unintelligible, and the special effects aren’t always convincing.

Content:
There’s a fair amount of language (including PG-13’s one allotted F-word), and, while most of the violence is kept at a distance, there are some unnerving details like the crazy Gilgun character offing a bunch of innocent hostages right after he said he wouldn’t. Then again, Lockout is so brisk and quick that most details won’t stay with you very long.

Bottom Line (I promise):
A cool premise + two engaging main actors seems a recipe for success, but Lockout seems so intent on being over with quickly that it undermines its better qualities. It’s a mildly-entertaining rental at best.

Lockout (2012)
Directed by James Mather and Stephen St. Leger
Written by James Mather, Stephen St. Leger, and Luc Besson
Length: 95 minutes
Rated PG-13