Action Jackson

Action Jackson

“Action Jackson” is a film where some of the performances are pretty good, but none of them do fit and most of them stink. In its exhausting 94 minutes, the film goes for so many different effects that I left with a headache. What do you make of a movie with one scene in which a cop outruns a taxi cab, and another scene in which the villain shoots his wife in the stomach while kissing her and keeps on kissing her? What’s happening here? “Action Jackson” plays like “Superman” meets “The Face of Death,” and it’s not meant as a compliment. Rarely have comedy and gruesome violence been combined so cheerfully, as if somehow the violence didn’t really count. Which way did they go on the rewrite? Did they start with comedy and then pencil in sadism, or vice versa?

The movie stars Carl Weathers (Apollo Creed from the “Rocky” movies) as Jericho “Action” Jackson, a Detroit police sergeant who has been busted from lieutenant for reasons much mentioned but never explained. He has had a long-standing feud with Peter Dellaplane (Craig T. Nelson), a maverick car manufacturer whom he suspects of sponsoring a murder spree against local union officials. Dellaplane is indeed evil.

In addition to shooting his wife in the stomach, he keeps Vanity as a mistress: she’s hooked on heroin, which Dellaplane supplies her with personally delivered in little velvet lined boxes.

The crime spree provides the movie with an action opening that is totally illogical (how do killers appear and disappear at will?) and several other inexplicable moments (why did that guy have an exploding briefcase handcuffed to his wrist?). None of the mysteries are explained at the end.

Nor is there any attempt made to reconcile these two incompatible styles within the movie: (1) those scenes where Weathers turns into a speeded-up Superman who can run 40 miles an hour and jump out of tall buildings, and (2) the slice of life realism of welfare hotels and police headquarters.

“Action Jackson” feels like two different movies that collided accidentally. That could be funny, but this time it’s sick because the movie’s comic scenes don’t go with its peculiarly nasty streak of violence. Did we really need the scene where they pulled out the Mason jar containing the guy’s private parts or the various moments when people are burned alive?

(I know, I know guys are always being burned alive in movies, and those are only stunt men in asbestos underwear. But in a comedy?) The movie has another problem besides this one: Weathers. He was well-cast as Apollo Creed, who had essentially one note to play, and played it very well. But in a more ambitious role his performance lacks necessary charisma; he looks great but doesn’t have presence especially next to scene stealers such as Nelson, Roger Aaron Brown and (especially) Vanity. And that brings us to the film’s sole saving grace: Vanity herself.

As with “52 Pick-Up,” she once again shows a certain naturalness on the screen, a grace and an ability to be comfortable even when there’s supposed to be tension. I felt I feel that Vanity, watching her in this movie where she is so unhappy, could play (does play) any person in (of) any other movie and make it work. She also has a couple of good song numbers here, although they do get killed by overemphasis on electronic rhythms.

“Action Jackson” looks like the first effort in what was meant to be a series of movies starring the same central character. If another one is made, they should decide whether they’re making a violent movie or a comedy; putting Vanity in the lead might help pick things up too.

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