AN AVENGING ANGEL AT THE HANDS OF FALSE PROPHETS: a review of "The Book Of Eli"

"The Book Of Eli" Directed by Albert and Allen Hughes
* (0ne star)

Once the last images of this film faded to black and the end credits began to scroll, I scornfully uttered to myself, “That was the dumbest (expletive) movie!!” I quickly ejected the disc from my DVD player, replaced the offensive item back into its protective case and placed it by my car keys, ready to then eject this painfully stupid movie from my home for good, leaving hopefully no trace of it (other than this review) behind in its wake.

My dear readers, it frustrates me to no end when filmmakers don’t try. The act, the art and the ability of being able and in the position of making a movie is such a privilege that it flabbergasts me when the opportunity is wasted. Filmmakers who happen to have a certain and relative luxury of time, as well as the possession of talent and artistry at their collective disposal, owe it to audiences and even moreso, to themselves and try to work at their absolute peak in creating a cinematic work of art. The results may not always pan out successfully but the honest attempt and passion for the art and the craft is essential to the success of the process as a whole. When it is a filmmaker of considerable talent and vision, any apparent jaded attitude is inexcusable to me. Earlier this year, I lambasted Director Tim Burton for his horrendous re-telling of “Alice In Wonderland,” and now, I turn my attention to Albert and Allen Hughes, twin brothers and filmmakers who blazed onto the scene with their highly influential and deeply resonant “Menace II Society” (1993). The Hughes brothers followed that tremendous debut with the 1970’s set thriller, “Dead Presidents” (1995), the documentary "American Pimp" (1999) and the gothic thriller "From Hell" (2001) starring Johnny Depp.

After lying cinematically dormant for 9 years, the Hughes brothers have returned with “The Book Of Eli,” an atmospheric post-apocalyptic pulse-pounder. While beginning with eerie promise and oozing with high style, the film is ultimately a painfully sluggish and empty enterprise made all the worse because by the film’s final moments, it claims to possess a significance and weight the movie hadn’t even bothered to present at any point during the earlier portions whatsoever. It is a pretentious, wholly false and sadly frustrating experience.

Since the plot line does indeed contain major revelations, I will do my very best to remain brief so as not to inadvertently produce spoilers. America has become a wasteland after a war-inflicted holocaust, all but ending humanity. Government is non-existent. Cities have been obliterated. Resources are few. Currency consists of all manner of odds and ends, including promotional coupons for restaurants that have long since been eliminated. The roadsides are littered with dead bodies and artifacts of long ago and in the shadows, lurk marauders, rapists and cannibals, all awaiting their next victims. As the film opens, we meet Eli (Denzel Washington), a traveler, hunter and guardian of a book, apparently the most valuable commodity in the land. As Eli explains late in the film, he has walked the Earth for 30 years with this book, searching for an unknown location “out west,” and he is determined to bring said book to its home by any means necessary.

After an opening skirmish, during which Eli dispenses several roadside bandits (beautifully staged in silhouette), Eli drifts into a small town, clearly evocative of classic westerns, for a glass of water and a bit of rest. The town is led by Carnegie (Gary Oldman), who controls the saloon, his mistress (Jennifer Beals) and her daughter Solana (Mila Kunis) and a fleet of henchmen, who are all in pursuit of the very book that Eli is destined to protect.

That’s pretty much it, as far as the plot is concerned and it is indeed an excellent set up. The Hughes Brothers’ grim staging of the future is envisioned via a dusty topography combined with the familiar iconography of cinematic nuclear winter landscapes merged with the aforementioned classic westerns. The cinematography possesses a bombed out sepia toned palette making the film appear as if it has essentially been washed clean of actual color. It looks as if you are viewing the world filtered through tinted, melted sunglasses. Also notable is the film’s evocative, moody and dirge paced music score, partially composed and performed by Atticus Ross, Trent Reznor’s frequent collaborator in Nine Inch Nails.

Denzel Washington, one of our greatest acting treasures, works like the devil to transcend the pulpy genre stylings on display to create a memorable warrior of faith. As with the film’s mise-en-scene, he immediately evokes film’s past anti-heroes, like Mad Max and even moreso, Clint Eastwood’s iconic “Man With No Name” character. Like those characters, Washington’s Eli is an enigmatic drifter with lightning fast and unforgiving combat skills. He is the quintessential “army of one,” an avenging angel whose inner purpose is so wicked, and so unshakable that he is nearly supernatural.

But again, all of these film elements, and subsequent praise received from me, are all contained within the film’s set-up, which you can completely gather in the film’s first ten or fifteen minutes. To make the film resonate completely, it is entirely up to the filmmakers to engineer a formidable storytelling framework in which there are strong thematic concepts to probe. While those necessary elements are in place in “The Book Of Eli,” it is all for naught. Sadly, what could have been a powerful, adventurous voyage through a dark future-past landscape, with themes of literacy and faith firmly placed at its center, the Hughes brothers have created a film that solely exists as an exercise in style and atmosphere, making for a film that is deadly with its shallow pursuits and lugubrious pacing. It seemed as if after the Hughes brothers arrived at their set-up, they felt their job was complete, hoping the meticulous design would be enough. It wasn’t and they should have known better, especially as this film is just begging for a level of greatness that never arrives.

I invite you to please take a moment and think of Director Francis Lawrence's “I Am Legend” (2007), another recent entry in the post-apocalypse genre starring Will Smith in a “last man on Earth” scenario. That film had style to burn, but what made that film stick to the ribs for me, was Smith’s riveting performance which truly delved into the psychology of this fantastical and devastating situation. The film’s eerie, unsettling visual staging and decided lack of an intrusive music score, allowed the viewer to sit in the unnerving silence of oneness, loss and the desperate cling to sanity.

Or how about Writer/Director George Miller’s unforgettable and undeniably brutal Mad Max series, especially the still jaw-droppingly brilliant second installment, “The Road Warrior” (1982)? With small amounts of actual dialogue, and plot for that matter, it is incredible to think that Miller created an extremely violent, desolate future world with equally wild characters that was so complete in its vision. You instantly understood every character’s purpose and motivation. “The Road Warrior” depicted a time and place to fear even as you were caught in the whirlwind enthrall of creativity on display.

And again, I return to television's "Lost," which contained the genre aesthetics of science-fiction but placed religious and spiritual themes firmly at its core. It was blindingly obvious that the show's creators wrestled with the theology of the program in order to make their character's struggles tangible to all of us watching at home. It is one of the crucial elements that made that program resonate so beautifully and it would never have been the same or as fruitful without that inner journey.

The Hughes brothers, on the other hand, never got past the storyboard stage and seemingly didn’t want to. The cardboard dialogue is painful to listen to and so clichéd that you can utter the sub comic book phrasings even before the characters do…which I did quite often. Every less than paper-thin character only exists as an archetype and never, for even one minute, as a fully drawn out human being. Gary Oldman is wasted again as he plays yet another generic villain. Mila Kunis tries hard, but it is so difficult to exude humanity in a part that just functions as little more than the pretty damsel in distress. As for Washington, despite my earlier statements and the fact that he could never give a bad performance if he even tried to attempt one, he was ultimately unconvincing due to a veritable storytelling tragedy that came to light during the film’s final moments.

The concluding 30 minutes of “The Book Of Eli” sails the film as a whole into a pretentious abyss from which it is not only unable to return from, it is a decidedly lost cause. I do have to express that I did not have an issue with the identity of the book, something I am certain you an guess for yourselves simply from the film’s title. Once that piece of information had finally been revealed, it was fitting as well as being the most obvious choice.

The issue I had with this film, was the film’s final reveal concerning Eli himself. Aside from a few feeble characteristic hints, there was nothing, absolutely NOTHING, in the film up to that point that could have suggested or supported a reveal of such significance. It was a reveal meant to upend and challenge any perceptions of everything you had seen thus far. Like the very best cinematic mind-benders, including recent examples like Director Christopher Nolan’s “Momento” (2001) and of course M. Night Shyamalan’s “The Sixth Sense” (1999), “The Book Of Eli “ goes so far as to suggest that this was a film experience designed to demand a second viewing. But, it just isn’t. It’s just half-baked, idiotic, ill-advised, tacked on and a tremendous afterthought. It was the definition of a cheat. Let me amend that statement. It was even worse than a cheat. It was the cinematic equivalent of almost any story's most innocuous conclusion: “...And then he woke up.”

I realize that what I am trying to explain may not make complete sense as I don’t want to spoil, but the thematic, religious and spiritual implications inherent in such a revelation were not explored for even one moment during any point of the film beforehand and the film disintegrated completely as a result. It's just not enough to have Eli carry around a certain book, mutter a few cryptic statements from time to time and have the ending this film has. I cannot express enough how much this ending did not work for me and if the Hughes brothers didn't care enough to do the heavy lifting to ensure that ending would work, then why should I care. And if I shouldn't care about those things, then why should I even watch this film at all? Once you get past the pretty pictures, there's nothing left and it showed.

And it's just so sad, because it is obvious to see exactly what could have been, if the Hughes brothers had only made the same effort conceptually as storytellers as they are as stylists, this would've have had one of 2010's best and most original films. As it stands, "The Book Of Eli" is easily one of 2010's very worst.

You know, here's another thought I had. Do they really want me to believe that Eli has been walking across America for 30 years just to get "out west"? 30 years?! On foot?! I guess he was walking in circles...kind of like the movie itself.

Destination: Nowhere.