Redemption

Released by: Lionsgate
Released on: September 24th, 2013.
Director: Steven Knight
Cast: Jason Statham, Agata Buzek
Year: 2013
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The Movie:

REDEMPTION, the latest Jason Statham vehicle to hit Blu ray is a bit of a mixed bag. The feature film directorial debut of noted screenwriter Steven Knight (EASTERN PROMISES and DIRTY PRETTY THINGS) REDEMPTION finds the action star in murkier and more ambitious waters than his usual fare.

This is the story of tormented Afghan war vet Joey Smith (Statham) who is homeless and suffering from PTSD and wandering the streets of London. The film begins with Joey being on the receiving end of a supremely violent beating from local street thugs. Joey is a major league alcoholic and easy prey for these criminals. After escaping, he manages to find shelter in a vacant luxury apartment where he discovers that the owner is conveniently on vacation for months. He assumes the missing man's identity and the main thrust of the story begins. Joey has been separated from his girlfriend Isabel who lived on the streets with him. He enlists the help of an area nun who runs a soup kitchen named Cristina (Agata Buzek). The two develop an attraction for each other while the nun seeks to find Isabel. After Cristina discovers that Isabel has been murdered and shares that information with Joey the real arc of the story begins. It's a vengeance story - with some pretentious twists.

The biggest weakness with REDEMPTION is that it really doesn't know what it wants to be. On the one hand, it's trying to be a serious drama about human loss and trying to be a good person in the face of overwhelming despair. On the other, it's an an action and revenge film with a simpleminded message - those that hurt innocent women must pay. The fact that the script is loaded with hoary cliches like nuns with hearts of gold and drunk veterans tormented by wartime memories doesn't help either. There are also just a few too many convenient implausibilities like that fabulous empty apartment with it's carelessly left around ATM card. This is lazy point A to point B stuff. Need the character cleaned up? Find some money. Etc. Finally the film has too many characters. What is the Statham character's ex-wife needed for? Doesn't he have enough on his plate with the nun and the missing girlfriend and later the hunt for Isabel's killer? And oh yeah he has a daughter who heeds money and... you get the picture.

The whole enterprise just gets a bit tiring. There is a distinct lack of focus and while the acting is fair to strong across the board it really isn't enough. We've seen these characters one too many times in better films. And the central dilemma at the climax of the film is as basic as a dumb Schwarzenegger flick like COMMANDO but WAY less entertaining. It's good to Statham stretch a bit though. Hopefully next time he'll get a better and more cohesive project to do it in.

VIDEO/AUDIO/EXTRAS

REDEMPTION'S 1080p 2.40:1. AVC encoded transfer looks very strong. This is a digitally shot feature by the cinematographer that brought us THE KILLING FIELDS so it is hardly sloppy work. The image is crisp and sharp and the nighttime scenes look terrific - even with the color palette manipulation that often goes horribly wrong. This is GOOD blue.

Praise should be given to the DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track as well. Whatever the film is lacking elsewhere it is in strong hands here. This is an immersive and well developed audio track that delivers on all fronts. Solid spatial separation, careful LFE use and nice ambient sound placement are all here.

The extras consist of just a brief 5 minute behind the scenes featurette with cast and crew. It is pretty shallow and more of a brief EPK than anything else.

THE FINAL WORD.

Despite Statham's game performance and decent overall acting, REDEMPTION'S unnecessarily ambitious and unfocused script and cliche setups doom it. It's a noble failure and only of mild interest to hardcore Stathamites.

Click on the images below for full sized Blu-ray screen caps!