Meeting Evil

Released by: Sony
Released on: July 24, 2012.
Director: Chris Fisher
Cast: Samuel L. Jackson, Luke Wilson, Leslie Bibb
Year: 2012
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The Movie:

Directed by Chris Fisher in 2012, Meeting Evil follows a man named John (Luke Wilson) who works as a real estate agent. The market hasn't been so kind to him lately and his finances have gotten to the point now where he and his family are in serious danger of seeing their standard of living pretty much obliterated. Things go from bad to worse for him when his wife Joanie (Leslie Bibb) has enough of his lies and leaves him - at which point he hits the bottle pretty hard.

All of this starts to change when John, seemingly by complete chance, meets a man named Richie (Samuel L. Jackson) who basically shows him how to 'man up' and take control of his own life. Through Richie's tutelage, John finds some confidence and soon starts messing around with another woman, Tammy (Peyton List). As enough time passes, however, John starts to realize that Richie's methods are not just unorthodox, they're flat out violent, maybe even psychotic.

This is a movie that requires from its audience a fairly massive leap of faith - if you can accept that John would simply go off with a potentially crazy stranger at the drop of a hat and accompany him on what is essentially a psychotic mission of vengeance, you'll maybe find more to like about this movie than some of the rest of us. The problem is that this leap of faith is a hard on to take. From there, we have to accept that John would put up with what he puts up with and that all of this would play out without interference from outside sources - another pretty massive leap of faith hoisted upon us by a movie whose script doesn't quite connect A to B the way you want it to.

And that's a shame, really. The movie is quite well acted. Luke Wilson, despite the flaws of his character in this film (and there are many) has that likeable 'every man' quality to him that's earned him his career in Hollywood. He makes mistakes, but so does everyone else and we can accept him as imperfect. Samuel L. Jackson is solid as the antagonist here, playing the psychopathic control freak exactly the way you'd expect him to - with a vengeance! He's menacing as he wanders around, heavily armed, out to complete his agenda and ware away at the chip on his shoulder. Supporting efforts from Bibb and List are fine as well, though they aren't given quite as much to do here as the two male leads. The film tries to make some interesting statements about the state of the country these last few years and about the effects of bullying. Sometimes it succeeds, other times it does not. There are quite a few interesting moments throughout the movie that make it watchable enough - but we're asked to suspend our disbelief more than we should have to for a movie like this and we're taken out of the realm of plausibility very early on. As such, you can't help but feel that this movie, a mediocre offering, should and could have been much more than it is.

Video/Audio/Extras:

The 1.78.1 anamorphic widescreen picture on this DVD looks fine. Colors are nicely defined and detail is strong throughout. The picture is fluid and natural looking and although there is some shimmer here and there, no compression artifacts pop into the frame. Colors are handled well and look nice and natural while black levels are solid throughout.

The English language Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound mix on the disc is also quite good, using the fairly subtle score nicely and presenting the movie with crisp clear dialogue. When the action scenes take place you'll know it and the levels are properly balanced throughout save for a few spots where the music is unusually loud in the mix. No issues with hiss or distortion to note.

English closed captioning is also provided as are subtitles in English, Spanish, Chinese (Traditional), French, Korean, Portuguese and Thai. Alternate language dubbed tracks are also provided in French Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound, Portuguese Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound, Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound and Thai Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound.

Aside from menus and chapter selection, the only extras on this disc are some previews for unrelated Sony titles. There's no trailer for the feature provided.

The Final Word:

Sony's presentation of the film is a respectable one despite the lack of extras. As to the movie itself? Meeting Evil feels like a whole lot of wasted potential. There's a good story in here somewhere and some good actors are involved with it but it never quite comes together or finds its stride.