Now Playing: Can’t ‘Getaway’ Far Enough from This Mess

I expected something terrible from director Courtney Solomon (‘Dungeons & Dragons’), but nothing this bad. ‘Getaway’ doesn’t make the least bit of sense during its 90-minute runtime. You’d think that fast cars crashing into each other and destroying everything in their path would garner some thrills. Sadly, I was left bored beyond belief and laughing at this poor excuse for a movie.

We follow Brent Magna (Ethan Hawke), a former pro racecar driver who comes home one afternoon to find that his wife has been kidnapped. A mysterious man (Jon Voight) phones and threatens to kill his wife unless Magna follows every instruction he gives. This involves driving a Shelby Mustang Super Snake that has been modified for Magna personally. The car now has bulletproof everything, all the technology you could want, reinforced steel and dozens of mini cameras inside and out of the car, so that the strange man on the other end of the phone can track Magna’s progress through his “game.”

Right off the bat, the man has Magna drive through buildings and ice skating rinks where he’s told to, “Hit everything you see or your wife will die.” This doesn’t bode well for the innocent bystanders, especially since it’s Christmas Eve and there are tons of people out walking around, enjoying the city lights. Later, Magna is almost carjacked by “The Kid” (Selena Gomez), who it turns out owns the car that Magna is driving, which was stolen from her. Soon, the mystery man on the other end of line has both of them destroy the city in the Mustang.

Oddly enough, the kid is a wiz at technology. With the click of a couple of buttons on her iPad, she hacks into government servers and the mystery guy’s network to throw him off guard. She even figures out what his motivation is in this whole debacle. By the time it gets there, the climax makes absolutely no sense and makes us wish we had our 90 minutes back.

Gomez and Hawke are the worst duo I’ve ever seen on camera. Their chemistry is awkward and awful. Gomez needs to attend acting school. She delivers each line with no real emotion or motivation. It’s sad to see Hawke in something this bad. From the car driving through an exploding power plant, to evading several motorcycles with men wielding machine guns, nothing feels suspenseful or thought-out. The only decent part of ‘Getaway’ is that it uses real cars and real stuntmen to create the crashes and chases.

If you enjoy watching close-ups of Jon Voight’s mouth eating and drinking for 90 minutes, you might enjoy this ride. Otherwise, this film crashes and burns quickly.

Rating: ½☆☆☆☆

5 comments

  1. Can you say paycheck? Or maybe Hawke just wanted the chance to drive a really cool car.

    This sounds utterly laughable and completely throw-away. I just love that people in the movies can use a bloody IPAD to hack into ANYTHING…

  2. The movie currently has a 1% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 72 reviews. Yikes.

    And the literally only film critic in North America who gave the movie a (mildly) positive review is a friend of mine. Ha!

  3. Based on the Rotten Tomatoes/Metacritic score and this great review, I’m very tempted to see this movie. Sounds like a blast of ‘The Room’ proportions.

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