The Cold Light of Day: Keep it in the Dark

When I saw the preview for Cold Light of Day, I was excited. Up and coming action star Henry Cavill teams up with super-star action veteran Bruce Willis to star in a father/son spy thriller. After watching the preview I was certain that this film would showcase awesome car chases, slick gun fights, witty one-liner dialogue between the duo, and some scantily clad ladies. And I didn’t even mind the implications of foundational chauvinism that goes hand in hand with the inclusion of female T&A eye candy, since also included were generous shots of a shirtless Cavill swimming and running in the full glory of the gorgeousness of his chest and abs. As I prepared for my awesome evening out, there were storm clouds on the horizon. Rumors of the film being crap, bad, dumb were leaking toward me. But I shut up my ears and headed out the theater in full optimism. Obviously those *other* reviewers had no idea how to appreciate good old fashioned action cheesiness. It would all be fine… great in fact… right?

Wrong! It was not alright, not fine, not great. The movie starts out with Will (Cavill) being a whiney entitled douche. He’s upset that he has to spend the whole stupid week on a stupid boat with his stupid family sailing off the coast of stupid Spain. Will finds out his company is going bankrupt, thus killing his dreams of … having a successful company? It is unclear what this means to Will since the audience was not introduced to what Will hopes and fears for. But we assume it’s bad news since he throws a little bitch-fit when he hears the news. Things continue. Will is a sour-puss, his dad Martin (Bruce Willis) is a staunch silent type that disapproves of the bitch-fits (and honestly, who doesn’t?). Will's mom (Caroline Goodall) is an appeasing type, and his brother is just there, not really adding anything to anyone and could have been cut from the film entirely—and I am not sure why he wasn’t actually. But none of this matters because the main part of the story, which we don’t even start to get into until 30-40 minutes in, has nothing to do with all of these characters and their familial dynamics. And beyond that, even if the film did have something to do with the inner workings of this family, the character and relationship building is pathetic to the point of not creating any sort of connection for the audience to care about.

All of this wrathful ire that I am displaying is in hindsight though. I was holding out to see if the film would get better despite the crappy beginning.

It didn’t. The family goes missing and we find out that Martin is a CIA operative that has pissed off the Mossad, who have in turn abducted Will’s mom and brother. Will and his dad find themselves running for their lives and somehow they have to find a briefcase in order to save the rest of the family. Sounds mildly promising, even after the boring and overly-long intro. So what would any self-respecting action movie filmmaker do at this point? Well, obviously Will and his dad are going to work out their differences and overcome their stubborn anger issues with each other in order to save the day. It’s a great concept that will completely erase the lame flavor of the beginning of the film.

But that’s not what happened. Nope. Instead, Martin is killed, leaving Will to stumble through the story trying to figure things out. Let me make it clear. Someone actually got Bruce Willis to agree to be in their freaking action movie, and they freaking kill of his character the second that things start to get actiony. Genius move. Now we’ve got Cavill, who is ok if you give him a good script (which this isn’t), but he ain’t no Bruce Freaking Willis.

So what happens in the rest of the movie? Well, it’s all a series of generic disappointments. The sexy chick that Will ends up being on the run with is actually his half-sister, so we don’t get any sexeh-time. Then the villains come after Will in a paint-by-numbers kind of way that isn’t interesting. And that really pissed me off because Sigourney Weaver (who, spoilers, is the main villain) is so freaking talented, it takes a perfect-storm of screw ups to make her seem “bleh.” The plot unfolds like this thing was supposed to be a straight-to-DVD release.

Honestly the only redeeming qualities of this movie are the short amount of time we get to spend with Bruce Willis, Caroline Goodall, Sigourney Weaver (when she isn’t being hampered by the direction or the script), and the amusing scenes with a night club owner that Will’s newfound step-sister happens to work for. So… 20 good minutes, 70 bad minutes. That’s a pretty crappy ratio. Even the “oooh look at Henry Cavill being all shirtless” scenes weren’t enough to distract. This film was a disappointment all around and I absolutely don’t recommend it.