Review of 3000 Miles to Graceland (2001) by German J — 23 Jun 2009

Fairly awful flick that I ran into on HBO today and sadly remembered having caught on late night tv about four years ago. This movie goes well out of it's way to run through every cliche in the "robbery gone horribly wrong" movie playbook including an absurd getaway/shootout scene complete with really bad Tony Scott style editing.

After it gets done with that they run through every cliche in the chase movie playbook and tries to make it all seem original with an overarcing Elvis motif running through the whole thing. The screenplay is sad with several really huge plot holes early on and the least inventive and ill planned casino heist in cinema history making overcomplicated and convoluted plans in flicks like "Ocean's 11" forgivable.

That one of the screenwriters was formerly employed as an electrician is not surprising, that somebody was dumb enough to give him the chance to write another movie 8 years later (according to IMDB) is alarming.

The acting is bad throughout with Kurt Russell being the only salvagable performance and also the only one of the robbers that can do a decent Elvis impression. Incidentally, Russell played Elvis twice earlier in his career.

Courtney Cox is terrible and her character entirely unnecessary. Christian Slater and David Arquette are awful as well but are thankfully murdered quite early in the picture. The really turkey here is mister Waterworld himself Kevin Costner who should never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever be let loose and be told to attempt playing a psychopathic villain again.

The film also jumps around tonally and can't decide if it's a comedy or a thriller and never really mixes the two enough to fall somewhere in between.