RANSOM. Directed by Ron Howard; written by Richard Price and Alexander Ignon; produced by Scott Rudin, Brian Grazer and B. Kipling Hagopian for Touchstone Pictures. Starring Mel Gibson and Gary Sinise. Rated R (violence, language)
More reviews by —
TITLE:
RATING:
Ransom's both more, and less, than just a Mel Gibson action picture. It's also a REALLY scary movie for parents (well, rich parents anyway).
The son self-made millionaire Tom (Gibson) and Kate (Rene Russo) is snatched for ransom. The kidnappers start out looking like typical action pix scumbags, but, in one of Ransom's interesting twists, end up being more interesting than that.
And Tom's not your run-of-the-mill victim, either. He ends up trying to out-tough the toughs, and does a pretty good job of it, too.
Gibson is really 90% of the movie, in fact, and, fortunately, he can more than carry a picture. He gets to emote more, or at least differently, than usual here, too. And while there's a not unexpected cat-and-mouse game between hero (Gibson) and villain (Sinise), both characters are drawn with some interesting shades of gray.
On the less side of the ledger, though, there's none of the appealing humor of Gibson's Lethal Weapon character (although the storyline here has a lot to do with that). What's even worse, though, is that Russo, who can do so much with a sidekick role (as she did in LW3 and Tin Cup, for example), is completely wasted in Ransom. So the domestic drama is much less satisfying than it could have been.
Having interesting villains and a flawed hero can go a long way toward making up for a movie's other shortcomings, though. And, except for a couple of spots that drag, director Howard, who hasn't really tried making a thriller before, does a good job of keeping us toward the edges of our seats.
I especially liked the frantic cross-cutting in parts of the movie between the kidnappers' lair and the victims' penthouse. Never being quite sure where you were headed next, or which scenes were happening at the same time, ups the anxiety level rather nicely.
So Ransom is worth seeing. Unless you're a rich parent who doesn't need new food for nightmares.
December 4, 1996