John McCann says ‘Breaking In’ almost had him breaking out of the Omniplex..
Reviewing movies for TraleeToday.ie on a weekly basis has seen me experience a large variety of films which, in general, have been enjoyable (some surprisingly so) with the odd turkey rearing its head now and again, but thankfully, not that often!
‘Breaking In’ the new feature from James McTeigue (the director behind the excellent ‘V for Vendetta’) sadly sits comfortably in the turkey category as a film that, despite a decent premise and a talented lead actor, never really ignites.
It’s guilty of numerous cliches and pitfalls that result in a miss mash of a movie that had me yearning for the exit door well before the end credits rolled.
Continued below…
Gabrielle Union stars as a woman who will stop at nothing to rescue her two children being held hostage in a house designed with impenetrable security.
No trap, no trick and especially no man inside can match a mother with a mission to rescue her children.
Pitched as a kind of ‘anti-Panic Room’ (an excellent thriller which saw Jodie Foster and Kirsten Stewart trapped in their high security home), plot wise ‘Breaking In’ offers a different slant on the hostage scenario with a determined mother stopping at nothing to protect her children.
And in Gabrielle Union, director McTeigue has a formidable actress capable of the action thriller genre, yet never utilises her talents as he should.
The overlong 90 minutes is one crammed with wooden performances, cliche after cliche and shoddy action sequences which make this feature resemble a TV movie (and a bad one at that!).
It’s not often I find myself bored in the cinema (entertained, thrilled, frightened, appalled maybe, but never bored!) but this trainwreck of a movie had me clock watching and losing interest long before it wrapped everything up!
With some highly entertaining features like ‘Deadpool 2’ and ‘A Quiet Place’ still on show at Tralee Omniplex and the highly anticipated ‘Solo: A Star Wars Story’ to screen this week, ‘Breaking In’ may well be one to avoid!
2/5
• For more of John McCann’s movie reviews, check out his Facebook page here and website here