Great cast, good story, only makes for 'okay' film

Posted Jan 26, 2012 By Mark Haskins

MOVIE: Contraband

STARRING: Mark Wahlberg, Kate Beckinsale, Ben Foster and Giovanni Ribisi

DIRECTOR: Baltasar Kormakur

RATING: R

EMC Lifestyle - Contraband is one of those movies where there's nothing in particular I could point to and say, 'this is what's wrong with this movie.' In fact I thought all the elements worked rather well together, but at the same time nothing about it really stood out. It's one of those films that isn't bad, but isn't great either. It's simply ok.

Chris Farraday (Mark Wahlberg) was the Houdini of smugglers but that was then. Now he's gone straight. He's married to Kate (Kate Beckinsale), has two sons, and a legitimate business. Then his brother-in-law, Andy (Caleb Landry Jones), screws up a run.

Andy was smuggling drugs when he was forced to throw them in the river when the authorities boarded the ship he was on. Now the guy he was smuggling for, Briggs (Giovanni Ribisi), is going to kill him if he doesn't pay him back the value of the drugs.

Chris tries to talk to Briggs, but Briggs won't listen. Briggs even goes so far as to threaten Chris and his family. The last thing Chris wants to do is another run, but he has no choice. It's the only way to come up with the kind of money Briggs wants.

With the help of his old partner Sebastian (Ben Foster) Chris gets on a boat heading to Panama. The plan is to smuggle counterfeit super notes, and sell them to make the money to pay Briggs. It's a simple plan until everything that could go wrong does.

I didn't dislike Contraband. It's a great cast, a good story, it's well shot, and well told. It has a kind of gritty realism with moments of intense drama and action. It's got all these things working for it, but it's still only an okay film. Why? Well, parts of it were kind of predictable. It felt like a film I'd seen a hundred times before. And while it may be well done, there's nothing special or outstanding about it either. There was nothing about it that really grabbed my attention.

Kate Beckinsale, Ben Foster, and Caleb Landry Jones each give tremendous performances. They really are very good.

Giovanni Ribisi has become an incredible character actor. He can make you laugh, he can make you hate him and he can make your skin crawl as he does as Tim Briggs.

Mark Wahlberg, captain intense himself, is completely believable as an ex-smuggler trying to save his family. He's the kind of actor who never phones it in. He always commits himself completely to a role, and this one is no exception.

A movie can do everything right and still not be great. Contraband is just one of those films. There's nothing wrong with it, but I wouldn't rush out to the theatres to see it either, unless you're some kind of obsessive Mark Wahlberg fan.

Mark Haskins' column is a regular feature of the EMC.