"Bait" -- Leaves You Empty-handed by Homer Yen (c) 2000
There's a lot that "Bait" wishes that it could have accomplished. It put forth some ideas that could have been entertaining. However, amateurish storytelling and the film's pedestrian pace will ensure a speedy trip into your local video store. Look for it to be prominently placed next to another similarly trite film, "Chill Factor" (and there are an incredible number of similarities between these two films that I would list, but I doubt that you would have seen either of these two). This movie features a couple of interesting elements, but as a whole, it can't put it all together to make this offering anything more than a marginally serviceable action film.
"Bait" begins with the improbable heist of $40+ million in gold bricks from the Manhattan Gold Reserve. Two men carry out this theft. One is a brilliant but psychotic madman, Bristol (Doug Hutchison), who has the ability to break into and bypass the most advanced security systems as if he was hot-wiring a car. This allows him to plan such a daring robbery with clockwork precision. However, he has no compunction about harming others, whether it's shooting an innocent bystander or setting off a bomb that may kill hundreds. And, he talks in this whispery monotone, making him sound like he graduated with top honors from the John Malkovich School of Method Acting.
Meanwhile, his partner, John Jaster (Robert Pastorelli), is just some poor construction worker-schlepp that he needed because he couldn't move all that gold by himself. However, when Jaster finally learns how mentally unstable Bristol is, he takes off with the gold and buries it in a secret location. This is not a very bright guy. In fact, sometime later that night (after he hid the gold), he is stopped for a traffic violation and sent to prison.
His temporary cellmate is Alvin Sanders (Jamie Foxx), a small-time crook who just can't make the right decisions in life. He has a good heart but not many opportunities to show it. Jaster's heart, however, is about to fail. And before it does, he gives Alvin an enigmatic message. Treasury agents, led by angry investigator Clenteen (David Morse), are too late in learning anything from Jaster. But they suspect that Alvin might know something. Their plan is to implant a tracking/listening device inside his jaw (unbeknownst to Alvin), spring him loose, and wait until Bristol makes an appearance. And boy, do we wait quite a long time.
"Bait" is a hackneyed production at best, but it's not the fault of Jamie Foxx, who is amiable and possesses a charismatic insouciance. The real problem is that the film just can't generate any momentum. For most of the film, we're just waiting for the bad guy to show up. Until that point, we get a handful of tangential subplots, glitzy visuals, and some neat editing touches, but nothing of any substance. By the time the 'suspense' happens, it pounces on you so quickly that it's impossible to really comprehend the moment. Imagine virtually nothing happening for the first 90 minutes, and then for the remaining 15 minutes, our hero must defeat the bad buy, save his loved ones, AND find a way to dispose of a truck-sized bomb. Given this kind of dramatic arc, "Bait" probably won't catch on with many moviegoers.
Grade: C
S: 1 out of 3 L: 3 out of 3 V: 2 out of 3
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