By TIM DAVID HARVEY
(In the latest of our #FilmsForFridays #SceneStealing series we get on your bike with Will Smith AND Will Smith for Ang Lee's 'Gemini Man').
Colombia. The streets are awash with colourful condos and sunbathe. And a puddle from the 'Welcome to Miami' like shower that was probably mere minutes ago, but on the surface looks like days gone. Will Smith (whose 'Focus' with Margot Robbie (whose 'Birds Of Prey' Harley Quinn featured in our last 'Scene') began this 'Stealing' series) sees a reflection in said precipitation that looks awfully familiar as he watches his 6 like Drake. Revolver hidden by his side like looking stupid with an umbrella right now, his uzi under five pounds of pressure feels like it weighs a ton, on the run from a public enemy in the scope. Two suppressed shots are fired under his shirt that break glass like seven years bad luck and we're off to the races were a nation of a million wild horses couldn't hold him back or drag him away. He poles around some flags and hides being the most beautiful automobile you've seen this side of the Buena Vista Social Club...that's about to need a new paint job. For the first time the creed of this assassin is scared like Michael Fassbender when those first week reviews came out. He makes a break for it moving across some magnificent murals that just made this movie all the more cinematic, hiding behind more concrete cover. Blue jeans holstering his handgun, before reaching into his man bag for more toys. Some machine gun funk and something that looks like an apple, but will keep more than the doctor away. He assembles the gun in attack mode with Schwarzenegger, 'Terminator' robot like muscle memory precision and mounts it on its side against the rock like Connery and Cage. He scopes his shooter who rabbits quickly.
Boy that kid looks awful familiar.
No time to think. Or it will be 'No Time To Die' Mr. Bond. Just run. Because this fresh kid has got his own bag of tricks. A gun that bends and curves bullets like Neo couldn't dodge. You know he's 'Wanted' now. A padlock bullet bursts open followed by the doors it used to hold. Smith fires some shots off and makes for it, like he does the stairs that greet him in this complex. Yet more mirrors see something coming up behind him as a balcony firefight that swings between the trees and ducks and covers leaves a melee mess worse than the critics of this much-maligned (but actually perfect for its own original concept, early 2000's time) movie. A grenade drops in like a penny out of nowhere and Smith seats it away like a giant before the balcony turns into a shooting gallery and then both marksmen take their positions before the smoking gun starts them off again. "STOP RIGHT There!" There's that mirror again that you don't want to look into like the morning after. "WHO ARE YOU?" Smith shouts like he already knows. "I don't want to shoot you." "Fine. Don't shoot me," the kid replies nonchalantly. "Mind if I shoot you," he asks with added cockiness of his age and stage. Will may have the high ground (or stairs) like Anakin. But this kid has his way. "Did they show you a photo of me?" Wait a minute does Will think this kid is his son? "They just told me you were old!" Ouch! C'mon man!
More guns, but no roses comes out yet in Colombia as its time to get dirty...on dirt bikes. Smith makes another break for it after they play hot potato with grenades and a shot better than Michael making a last play against the Jazz dance. The hunter well and truly being that hunted cliche now as this young kid flips down buildings after him like a free running gymnast who could also take off from the free throw line. But this 'Last Dance' has a few steps left as this scenes location but action does not change like fellow fall underrated sci-fi hit movie, 'Terminator: Dark Fate' from the factory to the highway like a 'T:2' with Linda Hamilton's Sarah Connor too (which we have also scene stole). We're off to the races and more beautiful borders of murals again as Smith races in the street on his bike like a steel horse or Tom Cruise and Cam Diaz 'Knight and Day' bull stampede run. Handling this animal like Chris Tucker mounted his motorcycle hilariously during 'Rush Hour'. Man you've never had a tour of this countries city so compelling as these tie bikes battle with silent bullets. Pigeons fly like John Woo doves for this Ang Lee set piece before the kid literally throws his exploding bike at Smith down below before inhumanely running into another one via doing the same to two men who used to stand beside them. Moviegoers are beside themselves now. It's all about to rev up again. Full throttle! Smith looks in his rear view mirr...SMASH! That's gone. More bullets try to sting him from behind like flies. Forget cover, Will needs a diversion. He finds away by taking out one of the tyres of a car between them minding it's own business and staying in its lane. It can't help but spin and swerve. Yet the kid dodges it on his front wheel like he's been performing dirt bike tricks when Evil Knievel was still trying to swing from his crib. No bullets left the kid has had enough now as Mary Elizabeth Winstead and Benedict Wong look on in concern from their own royal box view of this fight. Side-by-side these two lookalikes on bikes are scrapping like siblings now. Push and shove fighting over a favourite toy. Then in a childish, cheeky but cool gambit move this kid edges forward and trips Smith's bike using his back wheel as careening off his chopper Will almost gets crushed by a car.
SLAP! Here's to my favourite moment of the movie. What did the bike wheel like Dave Chappelle's Rick James' five fingers say to the face. Stunting on his front wheel again and some epic scoring the kid slaps Smith down with his back one leaving a bloody and scabby beard for the rest of this movie after this close shave that should have killed him. The kid donuts, revs and trips Smith again...but this time he's on no bike. Man that's got to hurt. The kid gets some run up space on his horse...and then charges. But this time Will sees him coming his way and the man that almost played Neo pulls off a move straight out of 'The Matrix' in slow motion for you (or the world's most impressive push up) to avoid this trailing tyre tread. Kid comes back like a battering ram at this cars hood. Right between the you know what's. He jumps to the top for his next trick. Finds position like one of these dirt bike riders up the side of a mountain and then comes down. "STOP!" Smith tries for another car. The kid takes one last run up. Revving the handlebars now like he's about to jump through a ring of fire. He loses his cap (man that fades familiar) and let's dirt fly as his bike crashes into the car like Smith tumbling over the bonnet to get away. Out flicks a knife. Smith puts up his Ali dukes. It's hand to hand for this combat now between these two killers for hire. But then flashing lights. Police sirens. Will turns around. The kids in the wind. Hands up. Here's to Will Smith's "bad" movies (yet the less said about the contrived 'Collateral Beauty' the better. At least his performance was perfect). That are better than most of your so-called favourite actors best work. Like the cult Netflix hit 'Bright'. Or the father and son post 'Pursuit' pre M. Night Shyamalan 'Split' resurgence in 'After Earth'. And we all remember the 'Wild, Wild West'...which this writer actually watched and enjoyed yesterday. The steampunk fun mix of western and sci-fi featuring Will Smith changing the game as a cowboy will always be an underrated seminal moment in movies (no matter what the original star of the show says) and still blazes like saddles. As he puts on his stetson, cocks his "let's stick to what we do best" rifle with "I make this look good" swagger and puts down any racist redneck before they even have chance to let the most vile word in the human language leave their mouth (like Will poignantly and powerfully told Stephen Colbert years ago, "racism isn't getting worse. It's getting filmed."). Now how's that for inspiration? Smith may have passed on being the one like Keanu Reeves in 'The Matrix' for this, but like 'John Wick' himself says, "I like 'Wild, Wild West'" and if you let your own opinion instead of critics and pass it on whisper hearsay inform your choices, you just might enjoy it too. And man that wicked, wicked song. Same goes for the twinning of 'Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon' director Lee's (who brought cell structure and that seventies show soul to his underrated 'Hulk' movie) 'Gemini Man' starring Will Smith and erm Will Smith. Albeit in young 'Fresh Prince' faded form for a 'Bad Boy' back on the boil for life like his 'Aladdin' love action Genie gave him three more wishes. Sean Connery. Mel Gibson. Harrison Ford. That's how long 'Gemini Man' was in production for. Aging action heroes who would probably need CGi for both young and old characters right now if they really ended up playing the part. But in reflection there's no better 'Gemini' than Smith or May 30th. And when it comes to the hell to burning rubber like leather action scene like a speeding motocross, we can't find many outracing set pieces quite as identical.
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