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S.W.A.T. starts out being exactly the movie you would
expect: S.W.A.T. troopers moving in on an armed robbery in L.A.
using strategy, tactics and most of all, weapons, to solve the
problem. It’s pretty fun. In fact, I wouldn’t have
minded one giant real time S.W.A.T. operation a la Colin Ferrell’s
Phone Booth.
After the intensive exposition, however, S.W.A.T. falls
into an expanded drought of interest while the team members spend
over an hour arguing, competing and training. It’s not until
the final half hour that the intensity picks back up again.
Our first major character is Jim Street (Colin Farrell), who is
kicked off the S.W.A.T. unit for being involved in the aforementioned
opening operation that turned messy. Six months later the L.A.P.D.
decides that they need a stronger S.W.A.T. team and hire Hondo
(Samuel L. Jackson) to lead the team. When Samuel L. Jackson walks
into the screen, you already know what kind of character this
is. He doesn’t even need an introduction. Jackson just emits
a sort of this-guy-doesn’t-put-up-with-crap kind of coolness.
Hondo gets Street and a bunch of tough cops together to form a
new team – so tough that Hondo turns down a high quality,
but friendly, rule abiding officer just to show how tough his
team is, and thus setting a great example for the police officers
of America. The team’s first real call is to assist in the
transfer of a wealthy international criminal Alex Montel (Olivier
Martinez) who complicates matters by claiming, on the news, that
he’ll pay $100 million to whoever gets him out. The rest
of the film treats us to Hondo and Street outsmarting the would
be rescuers, tracking down Montel when he escapes, and shooting
those who get in their way.
S.W.A.T. is fun for its fast moving, quick cutting cameras
in the style of “NYPD Blue” and its occasional home
video style shots that remind us of “COPS”. However
well done the shooting and editing may be on the technical level,
though, the erratic cameras actually become more distracting than
engaging. It begins to feel more like one of those loose camera
shows on MTV.
S.W.A.T. has a few fun moments, but the action isn’t
much we haven’t seen before and it feels like there’s
a lot of unnecessary scenes and lines, like extra packaging around
a handful of action scenes. The film also has its share of improbabilities
but manages to work without making such things an issue. S.W.A.T.
is perhaps the most fun where it allows us to be a S.W.A.T. member
and experience its real life intensity without living through
its real life jeopardy.
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