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About Jon
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Let’s go to the movies! I love the movie experience, study what happens on the screen and am writing about it to help you with your movie going decisions. Hopefully something in the blogging of a film’s big elements – screenwriting, cinematography, directing, acting, visual effects, sound, and editing (and sometimes automobiles) – will help movie fans discern where their entertainment dollars should go. I’ve been blogging about movies on 99x.com since April 2008 and have been listening to 99x since moving to Atlanta in 1996. I’ve worked on the Olympics and short films that have appeared at Sundance and other film festivals in the U.S., Europe, and Australia. I have a Master’s degree in film from Florida State University and regard film school as one of the best experiences of my life.
I currently live in Atlanta with my wife and two labs; love baseball, music, family and friends, good food, and of course movies. Just to blog down thoughts from an eyewitness perspective I avoid reading other movie blogs or reviews on a new release until I’ve posted my own. All references to box office results or cast and crew are culled from boxofficeguru.com, boxofficemojo.com, or IMDB.com. Wikipedia is not used in the writing of this blog. Follow me on Twitter at twitter.com/jonlamoreaux for additional movie updates.
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Jon's Movie Blog
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Oct
16
Written by:
Jon Lamoreaux
10/16/2009 5:28 PM
 Finally one of those lost in the season by-the-numbers studio films worth seeing. Jamie Foxx and Gerard Butler teach and learn their own lessons the hard way in Law Abiding Citizen. Both play workaholic characters living in the city of brotherly love who fight to earn each other’s respect, and mine by story’s end, with a smart exit by these characters like we haven’t seen since Sylvester Stallone’s Nighthawks (1981) or Charles Bronson’s Once Upon A Time in The West (1968). Maybe not as great as West (which wasn’t really a studio film) but Jamie Foxx continues to prove he’s a real star. And everyone knows you can’t be a star without star support. I’d say the script does its part but it is actor turned producer Butler who shines that light.
Within the first three minutes former music video director F. Gary Gray puts us right in the thick of things as Clyde Shelton (Butler) opens the door of his house to a murderer and rapist. Shelton is beaten up and tied down and blacks out upon seeing his wife and daughter killed. Later, at the hands of justice, the murderer makes a plea bargain and gains his freedom. Shelton doesn’t see the law in District Attorney Nick (Foxx) Rice’s logic so he takes the law into his own hands.
Fascinating thing though is part of Shelton’s law in one scene is like that of Saw’s Jigsaw—he uses torture like a game but does so while getting the best revenge anyone could wish for. In that moment you may feel like maybe you’re watching some sort of snuff film. Then, like Bruce Willis’ version of The Jackal (1997) he’s everywhere and booby trapping gadgets you’d never think of. He’s smart and controls his self-made chess game of justice from the get-go until Rice and cop partner Detective Dunnigan played by Colm Meany discover his evil tactics. But who is really evil here? The lawyer who lets the murderer go, or the victim who becomes a murderer until he feels justice is rightly served? When the two meet after ten years and Shelton is hauled off to jail as a murder suspect he and Rice have some really good dialog. Thoughtful dialog in a film is hard to come by these days, without the film feeling like a play or feeling it needs to expose plot points and back story in conversation. “How do you think your wife and daughter would feel about what you’re doing,” Rice asks. “Well my wife and daughter can’t feel anything because they’re dead,” says Shelton. Foxx and Butler handle scenes like this well even if Butler at times sounds like he has dentures and is talking with a mouth full of rocks. Fighting back a Scottish accent that obviously gets in the way of anything that might sound like he was from Philly. Either way the action always returns to keep the film on pace and the conflict brewing.
A few other things kind of rob you from the story, like what was the motivation in killing Shelton’s family? Who was it again that Shelton worked for? How is it again all this happens while you’re in jail? Aren’t they wasting Colm Meany’s talents? Shouldn’t we see a bit more inner turmoil within Foxx and Shelton? You might have to butter your popcorn to get all this down but I feel it’s a snack you’ll enjoy. One to look for on the video shelves anyway when the weather gets cold.
Rated R for violence. Running time is 108 minutes. The screenplay is by Equilibrium (2002) and Ultraviolet (2006) writer-director Kurt Wimmer whose remake of Total Recall is currently in development. Role reversals and character twists like you see in Citizen are right up Wimmer’s alley.
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