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This movie is another in a long line of movies to come from 1970s television. I'll have to take the studio's word for it because I was just a baby during the 70s. Samuel L. Jackson and Colin Farrell star in this new adaptation, and that alone makes this movie a must-see.
Jackson's character is Sergeant Dan "Hondo" Harrelson, and he’s in charge of one of the Los Angeles Police Department's S.W.A.T. (Special Weapons and Tactics) teams. Farrell is Jim Street, a former S.W.A.T. member who gets into trouble at the very beginning of the movie when a bank rescue results in the shooting of a hostage by Farrell's partner Brian Gamble (Jeremy Renner). Gamble is booted off the force, and Street is demoted but left in the S.W.A.T. unit. A few months later, Hondo gives Street a second chance at S.W.A.T. with a new team.
Meanwhile, Alex (Olivier Martinez -- last seen in America in Unfaithful), a drug kingpin, has come to Los Angeles to finish some business and is taken into custody after a routine traffic stop for a broken tail light. When he’s about to be transferred from local prison to federal prison, he takes advantage of the media by offering a hundred million dollars to anyone who will get him out. It's up to Jackson, Farrell, and the rest of the team to transfer Alex. The last 45 minutes of the movie is nothing but the shoot 'em up, blow 'em up carnage that Hollywood has become so good at lately.
I liked this movie, but it was too slow in the middle. The middle of the movie is training for the new S.W.A.T. team, which will make good PR for the LAPD but doesn't do anything to advance the plot. I especially didn't like the part where they find a creative solution using the woman on their team (Michelle Rodriguez) during training but never followed that up during an actual situation with the S.W.A.T. team. The very end was pretty lame, too, because it looks like two stuntmen fighting in front of a train -- which it most likely is. A better ending would have been able to show Farrell and Renner close up. But the attempted rescue of the prisoner, Alex, was original and very cool.
This is a good action movie -- and if that's what you want, you won't be disappointed. I, for one, was hoping for a little more violence.
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