'Cradle 2 the Grave' dead on arrival

By Marshall Fine
The (Westchester, N.Y.) Journal News

CRADLE 2 THE GRAVE (Rated R for profanity, graphic violence, sexuality, and partial nudity) Stars: Jewel thieves team up with a Taiwanese secret agent to get back rare black diamonds, in this video-game of an action movie. Starring Jet Li, DMX, Gabrielle Union, Tom Arnold. Directed by Andrzej Bartkowiak. Warner Bros, 95 minutes.

So how far are we from a future in which you can custom-design your own action movie: name the stars, then specify the number and order of the car chases, gun fights, fiery explosions and martial-arts battles. Oh wait a minute, we have that already, sort of — they're called video games.

That's exactly what "Cradle 2 the Grave" feels like: a video game. It also feels like a commodity, and an undistinguished one at that.

"Cradle 2 the Grave" has rudimentary, video-game plotting; you get the sensation of marking time (to rest your button-pushing fingers?) between action scenes. It's directed by Andrzej Bartkowiak, a noted cinematographer who has morphed into the director of brainless stunt reels disguised as action flicks.

The story, such as it is, centers on a high-tech gang of thieves. They open the film by pulling a complex robbery of a diamond exchange in downtown Los Angeles that's as hard to swallow as it is elaborate to stage. Led by mastermind Tony Fait (rapper DMX), the thieves scoop up handfuls of diamonds, though their real quarry is a set of rare black diamonds they've been hired to heist.

No sooner do they steal the black stones than they lose them, though how and why is apparently unimportant to writers John O'Brien and Channing Gibson. The script offers a needlessly convoluted and mostly nonsensical set of plot twists involving an inept fence (Tom Arnold), a rival crime boss (Chi McBride, slumming from "Boston Public"), an evil Asian arms dealer (Mark Dacascos) — and the film's other star, Jet Li, as a Taiwanese secret agent. He's also looking for the black diamonds, which, of course, aren't diamonds at all.

Given how complicated the story is, the film is dazzlingly simple-minded, with only two or three things on its tiny little brain. Most of those involve the deployment of martial-artist Li, who has yet to reach the level of such predecessors as Steven Seagal and Jean-Claude Van Damme in dramatic skill.

You know that, initially, no one will be able to handle the bored-looking Li, who often fights with his arms at his sides, as though he doesn't want to dirty his hands. You know that, eventually, he'll be forced to take on an entire squad of goons single-handedly (indeed, double-handedly). You also know that, before the final credits, he'll face a climactic showdown with a single worthy opponent — in this case Dacascos, a former martial-arts champ.

The film seems bent on furthering the acting career of rapper DMX. He's got a killer glare and a raspy deep voice to go with his brooding presence and toned physicality. Not much else is called for in this role.

When the writers programmed the computer for this piece of product, they punched the button once for sex object (and got Gabrielle Union, along with her body double), and twice for comic relief (and got both Tom Arnold and Anthony Anderson).

Alas, the film's creators forgot to program the film for narrative coherence. It seems doubtful that "Cradle 2 the Grave's" target audience will notice — or care.

Rated R for profanity, graphic violence, sexuality, and partial nudity.