Rated PG-13 for drug content and sequences of violence.
Starring
Dwayne Johnson, Barry Pepper, Jon Bernthal, Michael Kenneth, Melina
Kanakaredes, Nadine Velazquez, Rafi Gavron, David Harbour, Benjamin
Bratt, Susan Sarandon.
Written by Justin Haythe and Ric Roman Waugh.
Directed by Ric Roman Waugh.
GRADE:**&1/2 stars out of four
GOSPEL-DOCTRINE-O-METER: ** (two Moronis out of four) Snitch offers a little taste of the the same principles behind the Prodigal Son story, along with plenty of unconditional love and sacrifice. The only problem is most of those principles are mixed in with a lot of violence in an illegal drug business setting.
How far would a father go to save his son from being wrongfully imprisoned? That's the basic premise of Snitch, starring Dwayne (no-longer-”The Rock”) Johnson.
Johnson
portrays John Matthews, a successful trucking/construction company
owner whose estranged son Jason (Rafi Gavron) is caught up in a DEA drug
sting, set up by a friend who lied to the feds about his involvement in
trafficking in order to cut a deal. When John finds out the feds are
promoting “snitching” as a viable means to curb drug traffic, he meets
with the U.S. attorney Joanne Keeghan (Susan Sarandon) to plead for his
son, who is getting beat up on a regular basis in a federal prison. John
cuts a deal with Keeghan to use his business acumen to bring in “bigger
fish” drug dealers in order to secure his son's release.
John
seeks help from Daniel (Jon Bernthal), one of his employees and an
ex-con who served five years for drug trafficking. Daniel is reluctant
to get involved, since he is trying to get his life in order, but
eventually arranges a meeting between John and Malik (Michael Kenneth
Williams), a low-end dealer. John is employed by Malik to use one of his
semi trucks to travel to El Paso, Texas and pick up a few kilos of
cocaine. John complies, while the feds track his movement to and from
the pick-up, where members of a Mexican drug cartel await to load the
drugs into John's truck. During the transaction, a band of gunmen from a
rival cartel attack. John and Daniel escape, and in so doing help save
the original cartel. John's heroic actions impress the cartel's leader
Juan Carlos 'El Topo' Pintera (Benjamin Bratt), who hopes to use John's
trucks for future exchanges.
Upon his return home, John expects
the feds to pick up Malik and the deal will be done, but lead DEA agent
Cooper (Barry Pepper) decides he'd rather go after 'El Topo' instead,
letting Malik go. John is infuriated with Cooper and Keeghan, but agrees
to make one more run transporting hundreds of millions in El Topo's
cash back to the border so agents can nab the cartel leader instead.
During the daring cash run, John is betrayed as a government informant, and he must fight the cartel on his own.
Snitch is
not a terrible movie, and can be entertaining at times. That said, the
movie is mostly caught up in a lot of melodramatic dialogue and low-end
action. Snitch might have been better as an episode in an
hour-long TV series instead of a full-length theatrical release. While
the federal government's war on drugs is interesting, there really isn't
much in Snitch that we haven't seen already, much like several episodes of Miami Vice.
As for Dwayne Johnson, he's getting better as an actor, even though his huge frame still eats up most of Snitch's
scenes. I suppose he's destined to be an action hero for the rest of
his days, but it's good to know he has a little acting range.
Snitch's
producers claim the story to be “inspired by true events” (which is
usually code for “we made up most of this”). While I'm sure many dads
would go undercover for the DEA to save their sons, I'm also pretty sure
they wouldn't go as far John does in Snitch, so take that “inspired by” with a grain of salt.
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