Review: Sabotage (2014)

Arnold Schwarzenegger and an ugly neck tattoo plays ‘Breacher’, a DEA agent and head of an elite team, who has deep personal scars from his past. He and his team aren’t remotely squeaky clean and not above taking drug money for their own personal gain. Breacher’s team start turning up dead one-by-one in elaborately gory ways, and their latest haul of ‘acquired’ drug money is gone too. His team are played by Mireille Enos, Sam Worthington (as ‘Monster’, the surly, goateed husband of trashy crackhead Enos), Terrence Howard, Josh Holloway, Joe Manganiello, and Max Martini. Olivia Williams and Harold Perrineau Jr. play a pair of homicide detectives none-too impressed with Breacher’s motley bunch of scumbag agents. Martin Donovan briefly turns up as Breacher’s superior.

 

Although the names David Ayer (whose best directorial efforts are “End of Watch” and the excellent “Fury”) and Skip Woods (uninspired efforts like “Swordfish”, “The A-Team”, “A Good Day to Die Hard”, “X Men Origins: Wolverine”) haven’t always instilled confidence in me, this 2014 action/mystery from the director and his co-writer (who apparently has very little of his material in the final product. I won’t comment on that, tempting as it is) certainly isn’t boring. It is also, along with the even better “Fury”, one of the more stable-looking Ayer films, in terms of camerawork.

 

Although I have serious misgivings about a lesbian sex scene being rudely interrupted, the opening sequence to the film is pretty exciting stuff, though Mireille Enos is instantly amateurish and distractingly silly. Arnold looks old, tired, and not in the best physical shape. However, make no mistake, the guy could still probably kick your arse with one arm tied behind his back. I’d say it’s his best performance since “End of Days”, though the pain and sadness to his character was handled better in that underrated film. It’s interesting to see him in a slightly different, rather seedy role. He’s also surrounded by an interesting group of actors, if not all of them necessarily accomplished (I’m looking at you, Sam Worthington. Dude still can’t do a convincing and consistent Yank accent. Nice Jim ‘The Anvil’ Neidhart goatee, however). The standout is unquestionably Joe Manganiello, who oozes badass charisma throughout that simply can’t be taught. I’d never thought much of him before this, but he might just have something and you can’t take your eyes off him here. It’s a shame Harold Perrineau Jr. is once again wasted in a cop sidekick role, though I’m sure he and Josh Holloway had fun reminiscing about “Lost”. I just think Perrineau is a better actor than his career has thus far shown evidence of. The similarly talented Olivia Williams does the best she can with a rather dull role, but her Yank accent isn’t much good either, and she and Arnold have anti-chemistry leading to a very awkward semi-romantic subplot.

 

What I liked about the cast is that usually in a whodunit-style film (and this is basically the cop movie version of “Ten Little Indians”) I can pick the culprit because the actor in question just seems to stand out like a sore thumb or the character seems rather thankless to be played by such a familiar face (therefore, their one purpose is to be the guilty party). Here we’ve got lots of familiar faces, some very well-known, and several of them rather unreliable or untrustworthy based on previous characters they may have played. I was able to guess the guilty before they were revealed, but not because it was obvious way too early (aside from one aspect that is almost immediately apparent), that part of the film is actually pretty tight due to the well thought out casting for the most part (It’s a shame they don’t get much to play with in terms of character, however. I hear director Ayer’s original cut was closer to 3 hours long!). It was merely that enough of the prime suspects had been rubbed out early that I was able to pick it (And even then, there was one other person whom I wouldn’t have been surprised if they were involved). This is how you effectively conceal villains, folks. I wasn’t fooled ultimately, but I can see many others being fooled for sure.

 

The film is actually really gory, but I have to say, it doesn’t seem appropriate for this kind of film. The guilty person (or persons) in question just don’t seem like the type to absolutely fillet people as they do in some cases here. The squibs are just too much like paint, though I suspect CGI might’ve been used. Whatever the method, it doesn’t convince. The film is a tad more confusing than need be, with one supporting character (a rogue former member of the team) not being adequately explained, and one supposed murder plays out too much like a stupid accident that I can’t understand how it was really murder. It’s also a very, very silly scene (You’ll know it when you see it, it stands out like a sore thumb). The action is solid when it comes, but it doesn’t come often enough and the pace starts to drop somewhere in the middle a bit. It’s not boring, but there’s definitely a noticeable drop in the energy level.

 

Better than “Escape Plan” and “The Last Stand”, this latter day Arnold film isn’t boring in the slightest, and is refreshingly dark and grim for the Austrian star. It actually reminds me of the kind of harsh, violent stuff Walter Hill used to come up with (the underrated “Extreme Prejudice” in particular), albeit not as good. However, the gore is beyond belief for this kind of film, and Mireille Enos gives a ridiculously hammy performance that just pulls this back a peg. It’s a shame, the film could’ve been better if it just calmed down a tad (Then again, it’s also a shame it flopped so badly in the US and was released direct-to-DVD in Australia. It’s hardly “Raw Deal”!). As is, it’s very watchable, and a hair above Arnie’s “The Last Stand” and “Escape Plan”, whilst dragging behind “The Expendables 2 & 3”.

 

Rating: C+