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Summary:
Chev Chelios wakes up to find that he's been drugged with with a "Beijing Cocktail", which will kill him in an hour due to the slowing of his heartbeat, meaning that he has no choice but to keep providing himself with energy to survive. His only goal is to exact revenge before his time runs out.

Review:
Whewee! Finally, there's a movie that's wrought with fast cutting, rapid paced editing and extreme camera spinning with a PURPOSE! For the first ten minutes or so, I wasn't sure if I'd be able to handle all the movement, but after that, I stopped noticing and became totally engrossed in what was unfolding onscreen, becoming just as hyped as Statham as he's possessed by the need for an endless rush. I was totally "cranked" after watching this, and it's a miracle I'm saying this! Move over Guy Ritchie, Tony Scott (as of recently), Michael Bay and Wayne Kramer... take a look at this movie and realize how silly your attempt at style, flash and flair comes across after watching Crank!

First off, Statham plays the cool badass better than anyone else in Hollywood right now. The man's got charisma, a killer body, a smooth accent and an awe inspiring amount of facial scruff! No one could have played it better than him, and I give even more credit to the humiliating and outlandish sequence of him in a hospital gown. I got a good ten laughs from his running in a hospital gown (and THEN some) alone! I can't say enough how great the cast was in this movie from every direction. Dwight Yoakam was quite a piece of work, as well as Amy Smart's well-curved ass during her first scenes onscreen. The henchman were all memorable due to the carnage they ensued, and/or were given by the end of the movie. Some great fun was to be had when Chevo kept goading Verona over the phone. HAHA! None of these people are anything more than a vehicle for laughter and violence, meaning that I had a big smile on my face the whole time.

Do you like sex and violence? Well, you'll get plenty of that in this movie! Some titties here, Statham's butt there (for the ladies), and mutilated limbs from every which way make me wonder how the MPAA approved some of these gory bits. I thank them for the leeway, it helped Crank to be the awesome movie that it is.
Crank works on every level it attempts, because it knows exactly what it is. There's no attempt at an underlying social theme, nor does it try to impress you with hard-hitting drama in the midst of the silly over the topness of it. Everything is to be taken at face value. When it comes to style, there isn't much that hasn't been seen before, but it has never been more appropriate. The use of subtitles are more than clever, they're downright GENIUS (especially when shown backwards from the second character's perspective). The comedy... shit, man, I don't think I've laughed so hard during the Chinatown sex scene in any movie. EVER! That's not the only winning moment, either. How about Statham running through town in the hospital gown, taunting a motorcycle cop, and his little stunt on said motorcycle, eh? That is a full four minutes of nonstop laughter! Then, there are little moments from beginning to end that keep coming back to memory in little snippets ("Al-Qaeda! Al-Qaeda!") which make me wonder how all of these great scenes can be contained in one movie. Did I mention how extreme it goes to bring us some gore? The stump-punch on the concrete HAD to've hurt! MAN!

There are movies that demand to leave your brain at the door, but Crank managed to keep me from even worrying about my brain. It was nonstop entertainment, and each scene had a highlight which was only topped by the scene that came after it. It's exactly what Running Scared should have been, but ultimately failed at. Hyperkinetic, hilarious, tremendously over the top... and action packed genius up until the last frame. It was by far the most fun I've had all year at the cineplex!

GRADE: A

Reviewed: 9/2/06