Richard Donner has always had a magic touch with the buddy genre, at least when it came to his Lethal Weapon franchise. Without the template of Shane Black’s original script, 16 Blocks seems like a joyless remake of the former. If you’re going to do a retread of something, make it fresh as possible while staying within the lines.
Bruce Willis plays Jack Mosley, an aging burnout of a cop who is given a simple assignment – Take Eddie Bunker (Mos Def) to a courthouse for a trial. Apparently, he’s a key witness against a bunch of corrupt cops. One of these cops is Frank Nugent (David Morse), who is a close friend of Jack and intercepts him as he saves his witness from being shot by a lone gunman. Jack is given the choice to walk away from it all, and simply let the witness get murdered. In true Willis fashion, that won’t happen — he's gotta get to the courthouse on time you know.
Straight from the outset, I never got the feeling that Mos Def and Bruce Willis had any chemistry. When they finally become The Defiant Ones as they get chased around, it seems more like a father/son movie than a buddy flick – and I mean that literally. Mos Def’s voice makes his Eddie Bunker character sound like a Brooklyn version of The Beaver (from Leave it to Beaver) with Bruce Willis playing a hardcore version of Ward Cleaver.
I know Keenen Ivory Wayans isn’t available since he’s directing films, but he made The Glimmer Man better with his presence. Why not take him? He has the same equally annoying voice, but it’s not as high pitched and he always seems seconds away from a good joke (I’m sure he’d adlib the script).
Jack Mosley is also a rather lifeless character and I suppose was supposed to be in the vein of Martin Riggs (which Gibson played in the LW series). The difference here is that Wills wants to get really deep, almost to the point where there is no color on his skin or any sense of a personality. I don’t know what Mos Def’s Eddie was doing – or saying for that matter.
Article comments
1 - Mat Brewster
Just watched this and totally agree. Mostly boring, Bruce phoning it in, David Morse was the only life in the whole thing, and Mos Def's voice was absolutely annoying.