Review: Stop-Loss (2/5)’; Forgetting Sarah Marshall (3/5); Three and Out (1/5); The Eye (1/5)

Stop-Loss
(Kimberly Peirce):
Ryan Phillippe, Abbie Cornish, Channing Tatum, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Ciarán Hinds
Running time: 112 minutes. (15A)

Stop-Loss is a military term to describe the sending back of a soldier to a warzone despite them having served their time. It also refers to a point in a movie when it starts something and then gives up. Kimberly Peirce (Boys Don’t Cry) executes a perfect stop-loss: her film sets out to be an anti-war film and a critique of Washington but does an about-face. It lacks the courage of its convictions. The story adopts the template of The Deer Hunter – two soldiers and the girl left at home – but it never conjures the kind of sorrow that film had about a wasted generation. Instead, we get Ryan Phillippe, competent and bland, as the conscientious Texan soldier who decides he won’t go back to Iraq. He then makes the kind of U-turn that would make you spill your coffee. Channing Tatum plays his best friend and Abbie Cornish the fiancée at home. It is underwritten and Peirce does nothing with the camera to compensate: Ciarán Hinds broods as a dad, but they forgot to give him anything to say; Joseph Gordon-Levitt, a talented young actor, has little to do; while Channing Tatum is allowed to pursue his impersonation of an actor who doesn’t understand his lines.

Forgetting Sarah Marshall
(Nick Stoller):
Jason Segel, Kristen Bell, Mila Kunis, Russell Brand.
Running time: 112 minutes. (15A)

Towering slob and depressed musician Peter Bretter (Jason Segel) can add sobbing mess to his CV after being dumped by Sarah Marshall (Kristen Bell), the star of a CSI-type TV show. He goes to Hawaii for a holiday only to find Sarah bunked up in the same hotel with rock star Aldous Snow, a congealed hairball of sleaze in the shape of Russell Brand. Brand pretty much plays himself but he squeezes in some excellent one-liners. Otherwise the laughs are hit and miss. Its charm lies in the low-key presence of both Jason Segel and Mila Kunis. Kunis, eyes like almonds, plays a hotel receptionist who turns the threesome into a foursome. It is directed by Nick Stoller but otherwise bears the stamp of its producer Judd Apatow – another languorous sex comedy with appearances from jokers Jonah Hill and Paul Rudd. It could develop into a cult among heartbreaks.

Three and Out
(Jonathan Gershfield):
Mackenzie Crook, Colm Meaney, Imelda Staunton.
Running time: 107 minutes. (15A)

Three And Out is a British comedy about a London tube driver who needs one more suicide jumper under his train to entitle him to a large pay-off. The premise would not be offensive if it were funny, but watching it made me yearn for the twin comforts of a live toaster and a hot bath. Mackenzie (The Office) Crook, with a face like a mullet on a meat hook, plays the driver who stops a bridge jumper (Colm Meaney) in the hope of persuading him to jump instead under his train. Crook looks suicidal, like a man contemplating his film career going down the tube, while Colm Meaney larks through it knowing there will be still plenty of pay-checks. It is directed without wit or wisdom by Jonathan Gersfield.

The Eye
(David Moreau, Xavier Palud):
Jessica Alba, Alessandro Nivola, Parker Posey, Rade Serbedzija.
Running time: 97 minutes. (15A)

This is the US remake of the Pang brothers’ 2002 Hong Kong chiller. That film was downright spooky and used subtlety as sleight of hand. This version, directed by David Moreau and Xavier Palud, is in the dark. They over-amp the effects without generating much terror. Jessica Alba plays a blind violinist who is given a cornea transplant, when what she really needs is a personality transplant. Now she sees dead people, and her doctor (Allesandro Nivola) thinks she’s losing her mind. It comes with mandatory rumbling of sheet metal and, unlike the original, a bizarre happy ending.