海角大神

While watching the new Tom Cruise-Cameron Diaz spy thriller 鈥�Knight and Day,鈥� I kept flashing back to Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint in Alfred Hitchcock鈥檚 鈥�North by Northwest鈥� and Grant and Audrey Hepburn in Stanley Donen鈥檚 鈥淐harade,鈥� the best Hitchcock movie that Hitchcock never made.

This is not surprising, since 鈥淜night and Day,鈥� directed by James Mangold and written by Patrick O鈥橬eill, draws heavily on both of them. But, ah 鈥� what a difference. Those movies had a deftness and wit that propelled the action and enhanced the romance.

鈥淜night and Day,鈥� as is true of just about every movie these days that has a gun in it, is a supersized kid pic. It鈥檚 easier to sit through than, say, 鈥淭he A-Team,鈥� which was even louder and made even less sense. (In other words, it made no sense.) But as Cruise and Diaz kept dodging and trading bullets 鈥� and knives and rocket launchers and grenades 鈥� I couldn鈥檛 help wondering: With all the money expended on this movie, couldn鈥檛 anybody come up with a few good lines in between all the kabooms?

Cruise plays Roy Miller, a secret agent who has supposedly gone rogue. We are first introduced to him as he flirts with a fellow passenger, June Havens (Diaz), on a near-empty jetliner from which he soon methodically wipes out the flight crew. Taking over the controls, he crash-lands in a cornfield (pale shades of 鈥淣orth by Northwest.鈥�)

Roy is an amalgam of Cruise鈥檚 Ethan Hunt from the 鈥淢ission Impossible鈥� movies with a little Jason Bourne thrown in. In other words, he鈥檚 a pastiche of a pastiche. As always, Cruise plays these parts as if, even in repose, he was doing heavy calisthenics. He鈥檚 exhaustingly avid, which doesn鈥檛 help the romance much. He鈥檚 more interested in his own energy than his costar鈥檚.

Diaz is stuck playing the lovely-daffy damsel in distress, as the action shifts from Boston to the Austrian Alps to Sevilla, Spain. She gets in a few good punches of her own, as the duo is pursued by the CIA and the FBI and international weapons dealers and, for all I know, the Keystone Kops. By giving as good as she gets, June is not-so-convincingly transformed into a curious combo: a feminist snuggle bunny.

Maybe the filmmakers were tired of seeing Angelina Jolie mow down the opposition cyborg-style. Diaz turns on the waifish charm despite dialogue that curdles in mid-sentence. I sympathized more with the actress鈥檚 plight than with June鈥檚.

Even a good no-brainer action movie requires brains to make. It鈥檚 been a long time since a big Hollywood escapade had a satisfying story, but 鈥淜night and Day鈥� doesn鈥檛 even try for one. It assumes, rightly I fear, that attention-deficit stylistics are a perfect fit for attention-deprived audiences. I鈥檓 tempted to say this represents the triumph of the video-game aesthetic, except most video games have better narratives than 鈥淜night and Day.鈥�

The people who made 鈥淜night and Day鈥� may think they鈥檙e giving audiences what they want but what they鈥檙e really saying is: This is what audiences deserve. Grade: C (Rated PG-13 for sequences of action violence throughout, and brief strong language.)