{new on dvd} Premium Rush

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Photo by Sarah Shatz – © 2012 – Columbia TriStar Marketing Group, Inc. All rights reserved.

Here’s the deal: Premium Rush isn’t going to change your life. But it definitely won’t make you like Joseph Gordon-Levitt any less. And it might make you want to buy a fixed-gear two-wheeler, even if you’re a super clumsy cyclist like me.

What Premium Rush will definitely do is flat-out entertain you for a fast-flying 91 minutes. It’s a straight-up action movie with more bikes than bullets (thank God), and it knows the rules of its genre and agreeably delivers on them.

Empathetic main character with above-average physical skills? Gordon-Levitt is the King of Empathetic Characters (if you need more proof, check out the criminally un-seen The Lookout), and he lets us see beneath bike messenger Wilee’s arrogance quickly enough to root for him from the start. And the man (and his stuntmen) can ride.

The main character finds himself wrapped up in a nefarious scheme through no fault of his own? Yep.

Main character finds himself up against a villain of dastardly proportions? Michael Shannon (maybe you saw him in the excellent Take Shelter?) is probably still picking splinters out of his teeth: He’s over-the-top wonderful as a Very Bad Cop.

Main character nobly tries to Make Things Right? Uh-huh.

A little romance thrown in? Sure thing, thanks to Dania Ramirez’s refreshingly tough and self-possessed Vanessa.

A satisfying ending in which the hero prevails and the villain gets what’s coming to him? I’m not going to say anything more than this: Premium Rush is everything you could want from a no-nonsense adventure flick.

So give a big Boxing Day thank you to writer/director David Koepp (Ghost Town, Secret Window; writer of Jurassic Park, Spider-Man, Mission: Impossible) and his co-writer John Kamps (Ghost Town, The Borrowers) and pop this DVD in for an adrenaline charge on a lazy holiday afternoon. You’ll be glad you did.

gimme five | Premium Rush

Good for: Fans of straight-up action, fixed-gear bikes and/or Mr. Gordon-Levitt

Invite your: Friend who will never go to action movies but who really, really loved 500 Days of Summer. Alternatively, any teenage-boy members of your family that you’re trying bond with over the holidays. 

Snack on: Vending machine food. Highly caffeinated beverages.

Bring your: Bike helmet. Wear it in the theatre to mortify said friend and/or teenage boys.

Skip if: You’ve had any particularly distressing bike crashes. This movie might induce flashbacks.

What’s your favorite straight-up action flick?

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