Shoot 'Em Up

We thought this would be the perfect movie: ninety minutes of nothing but over-the-top remorseless action. The first scene is a psycho shoot-out where our hero Clive Owen begrudgingly rescues a pregnant woman being shot at by around 100 guys. But unlike a gritty flick like Payback, or the sleek ultraviolent Sin City, Shoot 'Em Up doesn't know what the fuck it wants to be. Rather than committing to being a spoof or a balls-out bloodfest, it's just a bunch of overproduced action sequences strung together. We can't fault Owen as the ass kicker or Monica Bellucci as a sexy hooker, but we can fault Paul Giamatti as the least intimidating bad guy (he even made our Least Believable Action Hero list) and director Michael Davis for having no focus. Come on, dude. We're your audience for movies like this, and halfway through we were hoping for a bullet to our heads.