RONIN

INTRODUCTION: Drawn in by the atmospheric and stylistic trailer, my confidence quickly waned on discovering that despite only being on a release a week this DeNiro / Reno thriller had been relegated to the TV lounge that is jokingly referred to as Birmingham Odeon 8.

SYNOPSIS: Five former agents, French co-ordinator Vincent (Reno), East German surveillance expert Gregor (Skarsgard), English weapons expert Spence (Bean), American driver Larry (Sudduth) and of course Sam (De Niro) are gathered together by the mysteriously Irish Deidre (McElhone) to recover the McGuffin suitcase last seen in "Pulp Fiction", shoot-outs, car chases and innumerable double crosses soon follow.

REVIEW: Frankenheimer started his directing career while serving in the 50's with the USAF Documentary Unit, before moving to ABC TV following his demobilisation. His first film "The Young Stranger" (57) was quickly followed by a series of acclaimed thrillers including "The Birdman of Alcatraz" (62), "The Manchurian Candidate" (62), "Seven Days in May" (64) and "Grand Prix" (66). Moving to Europe he eschewed tension for visual flair resulting in a series of popular and critical flops. With a few minor exceptions "The French Connection II" (75) and "52 Pick Up" (86) this descent continued until Frankenheimer was back to directing for TV. His descent thankfully ended when he found himself wheeling Brando around "The Island of Dr Moreau" due to the fact that he could not possibly make a worse film. This, however, comes close.

First time writer J.D. Zeik apparently takes his inspiration from the "tale of the 47 Ronin" in James Clavell's best selling "Shogun". Although what the classic tale of the 47 blood crazed warriors setting out upon bloody revenge and ritual suicide has in common with this tale of mercenary, professionally trained murderers left over from the collapse of the cold war, is a mystery worthy of its co-writer David Mamet who was brought in to polish up Zeik's weak script. Upon seeing the finished result however he changed his name to Richard Weisz and now maintains that he speaks no English.

De Niro is uniformly atrocious, as he has been since the end of the seventies, when parts suiting his inestimable talent(s) apparently dried up. Reno continues his downward career spiral, but fans need not worry as the last shot is indeed of him walking off alone down a dark alley. McElhone, the only one who appears to be putting any effort into her performance, does her best despite having to struggle through a preposterous Oirish accent. Dodgy accents are a particular feature of this "international" movie, none worse the Bean's English accent, despite the fact that he is English - doubtless it's because his character's from Hereford (a pparently pronounced Hear-ford).

The supporting cast contains no less than three former Bond villains; Pryce ("Tomorrow Never Dies") who sports a series of ineffectual accents; Bean ("GoldenEye") who, despite his British he-man image, or perhaps because of it, is ritually humiliated to make De Niro look good, and Lonsdale ("Moonraker") who turns up briefly for no other apparent reason than to explain the Ronin legend to De Niro. This casting clearly indicates where the film thinks it is going, but sadly it never gets there. The actual villains of the piece are of course the English, the Eastern Europeans and that old Hollywood chestnut an "ultra-violent" IRA splinter group. All are dispatched successfully and peace is brought to the World, as a BBC World Service announcement kindly informs us vindicating the CIA and demonstrating the vital place they hold in modern society.

Frankenheimer seems intent on re-invoking a simpler age of film thriller, a format at which he excelled, relying on car-chases and explosions instead of special effects, but Zeik's script is unable to maintain the pace and repeated shots of cars crashing through fruit and veg stalls quickly becomes boring. Any film that contains two car chases, one of which ironically takes place in the tunnel system below Paris where Diana was killed, is clearly short on ideas. This film is a rare exception to the Lizard's ban on all trailers ruling - in this case the trailer should be kept and the film banned.

An object lesson in how not to make a thriller.

Mutt's Rating: **

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