![]() It's so ambiguous and unclear that it might as well be some convoluted gobbledygook about an international scheme to keep Lady GaGa famous. He clearly sees Gibson as the crux to Edge of Darkness's success, and as long as he gives the actor room to roar, he's fine. Many of the supporting players get little help from Campbell. Then we learn of the potential motive behind the nice guy act and we feel manipulated all over again. His presence is supposed to unnerve and undermine Gibson, but he spends so much time acting as expositional support for our hero that he loses all menace. ![]() Similarly, Ray Winstone is cast as a hitman/corporate "cleaner" with a secret.and a conscience.and an affinity for fine food and drink.and any number of additional cartoon proclivities. Just as things build to a full head of cinematic steam, Gibson has another strange interlude and everything dries up. From half-remembered conversations to moments of father/child fun, these memories upend the sense of urgency and suspense being created by the plot. For example, Gibson's character frequently hallucinates, seeing his daughter in various imagined stages of maturity. Since the movie is based on a UK mini-series, he sees the need to add narrative contrivances that just don't function in a fiery bit of parental vigilantism. Sadly, director Martin Campbell doesn't stick with what works. But once fist meets face, or armory meets artery, Gibson ain't f*ckin' around - and we love every blood-spattered minute of the mayhem. Sure, the script tries to give him a softer side, a means of looking less like loon and more like an everyday cop on the verge. Once tripped, he goes off like a manic mushroom cloud, taking no prisoners and exacting his own brand of break bone justice. It's like he drops an A-bomb in his psyche and lets it slowly simmer to a radioactive boiling point - and woe be the villain who violates his personal space. As the bereaved father with nothing to lose and a chip on his shoulder the size of a submachine gun, watching Mel get back to the business of being Mel is mesmerizing. Perhaps this is why Edge of Darkness is so initially appealing. Between What Women Want, Signs, and a supporting role in The Singing Detective, he's gone from champion to chump in a matter of movies. Sadly, over the last few years, Gibson has given into the desire to be taken seriously, and as a result he's sucked away his special trait of beating the snot out of bad guys with convincing aplomb. Even the human adrenal gland himself, Jason Statham, looks like a wuss when compared to the "Lethal Weapon" himself. No one can kick-ass with as much acting authority as Mel Gibson. Yet Craven continues, uncovering a complicated plot involving the sale of technology to rogue nations, radiation, underground activists, and corporate espionage - and with a high profile Senator backing Northmoor and all its does, our distraught hero seems to be taking on the United States of America itself. Before he knows it, he is being visited by a dapper hitman named Jedburgh, who warns him against digging any further. He checks in with his child's anxious boyfriend and has a one-on-one with the company's CEO. Refusing to give up, Craven looks into his daughter's job with a government defense contractor named Northmoor. Just as things get started, however, the proposed killer is found - dead. Believing that he was the intended target of the shooter, he begins an intense investigation. ![]() Veteran Boston policeman Thomas Craven is devastated when his daughter Emma is unceremoniously gunned down outside his suburban home. Edge of Darkness is meant as a reintroduction, not a revelation, and on that level alone, it works well. While the rest of the movie can't match its lead, it really doesn't matter. It provides Gibson with a role he can truly sink his aging, perfectly capped teeth into, enough action to keep his 54 year old frame firing, and a good balance between emotional heft and fist-pumping punch-outs. God apparently has a sense of humor and wants to the one-time superstar to get back in front of the camera where he belongs (as long as it is not owned by someone working for TMZ, that is) - and his return to headlining, the effective if flawed thriller Edge of Darkness is a good place to start. Granted, those are pretty big sins to excuse, but he continues to pay (as only a recently divorced baby daddy of a Russian model's bratling can) in both his personal and professional life. No, not for his tasteless intolerance toward Jews and women, or his unapologetic defense of those who would support theocracy and deny the Holocaust. ![]()
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