Review

Review Date: 31-July-05
Spoiler Rating: Medium
Juju Judgment: Junk

Stealth (2005)

Windsurfing.
Playing canasta.
Learning origami.
Ironing your underwear.
Mowing the lawn.
Staring at the ceiling.
Giving yourself a root canal.

These are just some of the things you could do for kicks this summer, and I recommend any one of them over watching the movie "Stealth."

The latest blowout off the Hollywood production line has no redeeming qualities and nothing that could legitimately be called a plot. Instead, it belches out a few stock characters and moves them through a series of familiar but incongruous story lines. Initially, "Stealth" concerns a trio of hotshot Navy air pilots whose new partner/rival is a flying supercomputer named "Eddie." The flesh-and-blood stars are as bland as humanly possible, consisting of a cocky white guy (Josh Lucas), a token female (Jessica Biel), and an obligatory black dude (Jamie Foxx, a long way from his triumph at the Academy Awards). Naturally, the white guy is in charge and holds a soft spot for his fairer-sex comrade, who covers the feminine bases by being young, hot, and concerned with pansy things such as casualties among Third World "farmers." (Like a good little lady, she also becomes imperiled.) It goes without saying that the black dude is a buffoon and the least competent member of the squadron. This would be bad enough, but Eddie is the biggest disaster: although the trailer promised a souped-up HAL fit to strike terror in our technology-loving hearts, he resembles nothing more than a petulant teenager who waffles pathetically between bad, good, and just plain ridiculous.

I fervently hope that what these morons do bears no resemblance to what really goes on in the U.S. military, since it involves gross insubordination, appalling arrogance, and wanton destruction of foreign property and lives. (And the flick has the nerve to mention humans' "moral judgment.") Things appear to be heating up when Eddie goes renegade, but the action shifts thereafter from man-vs.-machine to heroes-vs.-bad-guys, the latter being represented by Sam Shepard as a captain with an inexplicable nasty streak. This, in turn, devolves into a sappy love story tinged with "leave no man behind" pseudo-patriotism, which gives Lucas the opportunity to act macho and acquire sexy wounds. (I assume they're meant to be sexy. The most I can say for this up-and-coming pretty boy is that he's vaguely reminiscent of Errol Flynn, only without the sense of humor and fluid sexuality. And with his eyes set too close together.)

While the screenwriter of this crap (W. D. Richter) ought to be flogged, director Rob Cohen should be run out of the business. He not only makes Mach-10 chases supremely boring but commits such a slo-mo no-no at the catastrophic central moment that I actually laughed out loud. (Which, by the way, I also did at the climactic moment when Eddie makes his final stand.) What more can I say? Now that you're done reading my review, let "Stealth" disappear from your radar screen, and let's neither of us ever think of it again.

Copyright © 2005 The Jujube (M. I. Kim). All rights reserved.