Freejack
The one where Mick Jagger is the good badguy with a silly helmet.
It is THE FUTURE in 2009. New York consists of a Manhattan-Brasília mash-up, surrounded by a sprawl of 2009-era Detroit. So, it’s actually an optimistic version of Escape from New York.
In 2009, Mick Jagger looked to be in his thirties even if he was 50 (this is realistic) and his job title was “bone-jacker”. It doesn’t have anything to do with groupies, he hijacks people from the past so that the rich can download their brains into those pristine bodies, unaffected by hunger, famine and diseases that plague THE FUTURE in 2009.
It’s hard to see how can anyone be rich is this universe, since there is only a single company that owns everything. The boss is played by Anthony Hopkins in sleepwalking mode, so all the Howard Hughes references are downplayed.
One of the jacked is Emilio Estevez with an indigent script that leaves him with a role best described as Arnie without the one-liners. His Virgil in this brave new world is a nun-too-holy sister played by Amanda Plummer that blows everyone else out of the water. Lines like this1 almost make it worth it.
His agent rats him out to the cops and even his girlfriend can’t believe at first he has showed up after 20 years. She is a ruthless corporate executive with a direct line to the head of the single corporate conglomerate.
Long story short, the lead takes the job of leader of the world, gets the girl and rides into the sunset with the help of Mr. Jagger.
As I mentioned before, the script is complete hogwash, even with Linda Fiorentino I can’t see this getting much better. There are scenes where the script breaks down and leads to long awkward silences between characters, and not implying anything, just looking bored to death. The action scenes are from a time when practical effects were uncool and old-fashioned and CGI was all the rage and absolute crap. The green screen scenes are at the level of North by Northwest, created over 30 years before with simple rear projection.
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Amanda Plummer quote on Freejack
Nun: [after being slapped violently] The Good Lord always says to turn the other cheek.
[Swings foot up, kicking Michellete in the groin. Michellete moans in pain]
Nun: But he never had to deal with dickheads like you.
This is my place for ramblings about sequences of images that exploit the human visual limitation know as persistence of vision.