US Marshals

The massive success of The Fugitive surprised everyone. Harrison Ford’s star power was not the concern. The release day was. It opened in August, the summer movie graveyard (witness summers past: Snake Eyes, The Avengers, and Conspiracy Theory are examples of decent August releases; not so decent releases include A Smile Like Yours). By defying such odds, Warners figured they had a sure hit in a sequel. However, since Ford’s character is acquitted at the end of the first movie, they obviously can’t use him in the second. So the plan was to focus on US Marshal Sam Gerard (Tommy Lee Jones), the man who always gets his man, and his hunt for a different fugitive. They got it about half right.

US Marshals isn’t a bad film. But when held up to its predecessor, its flaws are many and glaring. They clearly tried not to mess with something that worked so well the first time, from script to cast and even director. Since Fugitive director Andrew Davis was not available, they hired Stuart Baird, the Director of Photography from The Fugitive. The problem is, they’re not doing a sequel so much as a remake. The story line is identical, and the fugitive in question, played by Wesley Snipes, isn’t half as charismatic the actor that Ford is. And the one addition they did make, a Fed assigned to the manhunt (a between-jail-stints Robert Downey Jr.) didn’t work very well.

Snipes plays Mike Sheridan, a former government spook accused of whacking two other Feds and making off with a suitcase full of cash. While in transfer to a maximum security prison via airplane (Think Con Air), a botched attempt on his life blows a hole in a window and sends the plane crashing into a river. Sheridan temporarily helps Gerard, who was on board as well, save prisoners trapped underwater. But then Gerard blinks, and Sheridan is gone. And for kicks, let’s throw in a Fed (Downey Jr.) who wants to whack Sheridan in retaliation for what Sheridan did to his goon friends. Let the games begin

Except you can’t help but wonder, Haven’t I already played this game? The script is a carbon copy of The Fugitive. It opens with a sequence of Gerard and his gang snagging a bad guy, then the setup of the innocent, then the Great Escape sequence (last one by train, this one by plane), after which comes the slow realization by Gerard and his group that Sheridan may not be so guilty after all. I love Tommy Lee Jones, the man does little wrong in my book. The character of Gerard takes very little acting on his part. Gerard is very sure of himself, tough and extremely difficult to work with, as is Jones. The chemistry Gerard and his fellow deputies share is the most enjoyable part of the movie. But they can’t survive the familiarity and ultimate lack of suspense the movie carries with it. And I hate to say this, but the special effects were pretty cheap, too. Stuart Baird may be a perfectly capable director, but based on this movie, the results are inconclusive.

This movie is actually an okay rental and overall entertaining. But with the shadow of The Fugitive looming overhead, it’s nearly impossible to grade it on its own merits without imaging what could have been. If they make a third one (and given the performance of this one, I doubt they will), their best bet is to turn the story on its ear and do something radically different.