The Badger Herald: ArtsEtc.: Don’t shed any ‘Tears’ for Willis’ latest

ArtsEtc.

Don’t shed any ‘Tears’ for Willis’ latest

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Also by Amy Owen:

"Big Fish" swims to the head of the school (January 22, 2004)
'Tupac: Resurrection' (November 24, 2003)
"Open Range" sprawls on (September 8, 2003)
Glabicki takes 'Root' in Madison (September 11, 2003)

Monday, March 31, 2003 12:00 a.m.

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“Tears of the Sun,” directed by Antoine Fuqua of “Training Day” fame, proves that an action thriller with a weighty message simply does not work. By setting uber-action hero Bruce Willis in the civil wars that plague Africa, the movie turns the true gravity of fighting African tribes into a seemingly overdone Hollywood creation.

The film begins with a stealthy and handsome fleet of U.S. Navy Seals retrieving its latest assignment. The team must rescue four American citizens from a threatened Nigerian tribe. The four rescuees include one Dr. Lena Kendricks (Monica Bellucci, “Under Suspicion”) who fills the role of the sexy and dedicated damsel in distress with a merely superficial ability to captivate the audience.

Lt. A.K. (Willis, “Die Hard”) intends this rescue assignment to be quick and smooth, but, of course, it turns out to be just the opposite. As he unnecessarily swoops in clandestinely from a swamp in Dr. Kendricks’ village, he realizes that she does not intend to leave “her people” behind without a fight.

She refuses to see them become the next tribe to be wiped off the continent. Willis, at first, shows no sympathy for the doctor, but quickly changes his mind when he realizes the attachment the doctor has to the tribe (or maybe it is when he finds out her American husband is out of the picture).

Irrationally and unrealistically, Willis decides to lead Dr. Kendricks’ entire tribe across the Nigerian border without the other three American citizens he was sent to save. Making it difficult for the audience to help from giggling when it sees his sultry, yet dumbfounded stare following any emotional pinnacle in the film, Willis creates a “Zoolander”-esque hero.

Between the mounting lackluster love story and the pitiable bonding scenes among the Navy Seals, the movie shows no signs of originality. These storylines soon take precedence over the plight of the African people.

For example, when the rebel Nigerian troops seem to be within an hour of the tribe crossing the jungles of Nigeria, Lt. Waters takes time out to make sure his men agree upon his decision to help the threatened tribe. Realistically, this scene takes up half the time that they supposedly have before the rebels reach their position and detracts from the suspense.

Toying with the audience’s emotions, the film dives from the cheap overacting of the uniform characters in a familiar plot to the horrific and credible scenes of the tribal cleansing that actually does occur in Africa. From sequence to sequence, the film is lost in an uncalled-for struggle, asking the viewer to sympathize both with its protagonists and with the extras embodying the woes of the world.

The movie makes it impossible to take Willis seriously. The only thing it succeeds in is its beautiful depiction of a country rich in natural beauty but poor in humanitarian harmony. In contrast to the acting, the captivating cinematography inspires deep thought as it depicts the grotesque practices of ethnic cleansing.

This imbalance leads one to believe that somewhere along the assembly line of this movie, it may have been meant to portray some sort of deeper meaning rather than the hackneyed genre-film approach it ends up with.

Grade: D