'Collateral Damage' is fair, by-the-numbers action flick

By Jack Garner
Gannett News Service

COLLATERAL DAMAGE (Rated R with violence, profanity) Two Stars (Fair) A standard action film, built on the revenge formula, with Arnold Schwarzenegger as a Los Angeles fireman who travels to Colombia to kill the terrorists whose bomb killed his innocent wife and child. Francesca Neri and Cliff Curtis co-star for director Andrew Davis. Warner Bros., 115 mins.

After all, it's about a guy (Arnold Schwarzenegger) whose wife and child are killed in a terrorist bombing. So its mid-September release was scrapped. Common sense made the call.

But now that the film is upon us, we can see it's too shallow and superficial to be taken too seriously. If America can embrace the far better, far-more-relevant, far-more-disturbing "Black Hawk Down," then "Collateral Damage" barely will register on our nation's bruised psyche.

"Collateral Damage's" sole contribution to post-9/11 America simply might be that it establishes a firefighter as the hero of its unlikely adventures. However, beyond a few early, on-the-job establishment shots, this fireman's heroics aren't in burning buildings. He is a revenge-seeking warrior.

Schwarzenegger is Gordy Brewer, a Los Angeles fireman with a loving wife and son. But they're killed, simply because they're enjoying lunch at an outdoor cafe, just when a terrorist bomb is detonated.

Thus is launched a standard action-movie plot: The revenge of the Everyman. All the elements are in place — the dastardly death of innocent loved ones, the pure evil of the villains, and the ineffectual nature of legitimate law enforcement (in this case, the FBI and the CIA). Gordy must take matters in his own muscular hands.

A gang of Colombian rebels claim responsibility for the act — and the bomber was the leader of the organization, a terrorist known as El Lobo (the Wolf), played by Cliff Curtis. (Don't terrorist leaders usually send other guys to do their dirty work?)

Gordy quickly sees that the CIA isn't willing to help, especially as exemplified by an abrasive South American operative (Elias Koteas).

So Gordy makes his way to Colombia and into the dangerous rebel territory. The Colombian authorities and the rebels know he's coming, and Arnold stands out in the Colombian villages like an NFL lineman at a quilting bee. Nonetheless, he manages to get to the rebel hideout, even to the point of standing just outside El Lobo's window.

Along the way, Gordy helps a young mother (Francesca Neri) and her son, set up by the screenwriters to parallel the wife and child he lost. Well, wouldn't you know it? They're El Lobo's wife and child.

Anyway, through a variety of coincidences and improbabilities, piled to the ceiling, Gordy and El Lobo finally get to go hombre-a-hombre.

As an action movie "Collateral Damage" starts strong and finishes with a nice surprise twist, and 20 minutes of excitement. The vast middle portion offers several patches of dull exposition.

Director Andrew Davis is a veteran of Chuck Norris and Steven Seagal action films, as well as the more superior "Fugitive." (Here he duplicates Richard Kimble's famous leap from a dam, sending Gordy off a giant Colombian waterfall.)

Some of Davis action choreographer is exciting, though he favors extreme close-ups of the various fights, skirmishes and rescues, which makes it difficult to see clearly what's going on.

Generally, "Collateral Damage" is a throwback to Davis' earlier, less believable action flicks.

Fans looking for more substance will have to be content with a few scenes in the midst of the baloney, featuring the always-excellent John Turturro as a Canadian emigre who Gordy encounters in a Colombian prison, and the energetic John Leguizamo as an amoral, opportunistic cocaine manufacturer.

Both guys disappear far too quickly. In just his 10 minutes on screen, Turturro, in particular, made me realize I'd MUCH rather have seen his character's story than Gordy's.

Rated R, with strong violence, profanity.