Director(s): David Palmer, Dax Shepard
Cast: Dax Shepard, Kristen Bell, Bradley Cooper, Tom Arnold
Running time: 100 minutes
Synopsis: Charlie Bronson lives a happy life in rural North America under the witness protection plan. But soon he’s being chased by cops, gang members and resenting exes all the way to LA, as he escorts girlfriend Annie to a job interview…
HIT AND RUN opens much in the way you’d expect a chase movie to open: with a bungling US Marshall chasing his driverless mini-van down a road, flailing his arms, shooting wildly at it and cursing loudly. Okay, maybe that was a tiny bit sarcastic.
But buffoonish Randy (Tom Arnold) is core to HIT AND RUN for one simple reason: he’s the main comedic thrust of this pleasing genre mash-up. Half rom-com, two quarters action thriller and a third chase movie, HIT AND RUN finds its strengths not in its romantic elements – of which we are at times little convinced – but instead in its humour.
Charlie Bronson (not the one you’re thinking of, here played by writer-director Dax Shepard) is under witness protection, living out his days in a small rural town with his girlfriend Annie (Kristen Bell). Sucks for him, then, when Annie gets offered a dream job in LA – exactly the place where Charlie’s escaped from, leaving his past behind. And, as it turns out, there’s a whole darker side to that past than is first clear, to both us and Annie, which unfolds as the pair take the steady journey back to LA.
Well, I say steady journey – but obviously it’s not that simple. But this is where the film really kicks off, with Charlie and Annie being pursued by not only Randy – who’s determined to get the pair back home safely – but also the crooks Charlie put away and Annie’s ex-boyfriend, who’s convinced Charlie is as criminal as those he’s escaping from. Oh, and let’s not forget the cops helping Randy out – after all, they help the Marshall to steal every single scene that he’s in, always one step behind the rest.
The romantic element of HIT AND RUN is admittedly a mixed bag, which is slightly telling of the two leads when they’re actually engaged in real life. Still, at times the dialogue feels more real because of this relationship, and the delivery proffers an endearing chemistry between the pair – but other times it’s hard to believe the decisions they make would be at all realistic, disconnecting us from the reality of their relationship and causing us to lose interest in the dynamic between them at all.
HIT AND RUN’s action more than make up for this, thankfully, with engaging and exciting car chases. And while Shepard spends most of the film shouting his way through the script – his comedic timing often particularly off-key – the rest of the cast (notably Bradley Cooper as the indignant crook Charlie put away, and even, to an extent, Bell) offer much more. Even where Shepard’s acting drops, his direction (in conjunction with David Palmer) succeeds; HIT AND RUN is fantastically, beautifully shot.
But looks aren’t everything, and ultimately, the proceedings simply lack depth – though while by its climax we’re not accustomed to caring about any of its characters too much, HIT AND RUN at least takes us along for an entertaining ride. And if there’s a film this year which makes better use of that metaphor, then I haven’t heard of it.
HIT AND RUN is in cinemas from Friday 12th October.
Chris started life by almost drowning in a lake, which pretty much sums up how things have gone so far. He recently graduated in Journalism from City University and is actually a journalist and everything now (currently working as Sports Editor at The News Hub). You can find him on Twitter under the ingenious moniker of @chriswharfe.
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