MAN ON FIRE

MAN ON FIRE is a tough film to review, in that it's hard to discuss one of its central issues without giving away a key plot twist. Based on the novel by A.J. Quinnell (which was filmed once before, in 1987, with Scott Glenn in the lead and Italy as the setting), MAN concerns ex-CIA operative/assassin John Creasy (Denzel Washington), an unhappy, guilt-ridden man with a drinking problem and a bleak outlook. When his friend Rayburn (Christopher Walken) offers him a job as bodyguard to the young daughter (Dakota Fanning) of a Mexican industrialist (Marc Anthony), Creasy doesn't exactly jump at the opportunity. Even so, he accepts the gig, which is dangerous not only because Mexico City is a hotbed of the ransom game 24 kidnappings for profit within six days but because of the emotional peril.

The little girl Lupita, called "Pita" by everyone, is determined to befriend Creasy and, despite his belief that he is beyond the reach of anything human, a bond develops. Then kidnappers strike. Despite the bodyguard's best efforts, Pita is grabbed and Creasy is shot and nearly killed in the ensuing skirmish. When he emerges from his hospital bed two months later, Creasy is informed that the ransom drop was botched and Pita is dead. Creasy's old self, the one he feels God cannot forgive, rises to the surface, torturing and killing pretty much everyone connected with the crime.

Director Tony Scott and writer Brian Helgeland keep all their balls spinning to a point the kidnapping scenario is suitably complex and layered but once Creasy launches into implacable action, they are caught trying to have things both ways. On the one hand, the filmmakers seem to want us to feel torn by what we're seeing Creasy's understandable rage and grief vs. some people who are for the most part pretty pathetic and messed up even before he gets hold of them and on the other, we are asked to root for the revenge scenario. These two results tend to cancel each other out, with the result that we wind up distanced, our minds more on puzzling out what the filmmakers intend us to feel rather than actually having a strong emotional reaction one way or the other.

This said, Washington is excellent, exuding implacable menace and sorrow; he makes us believe Creasy is fully capable of everything he does while loathing himself the whole time. Walken, who has to give a really awkward, on the nose speech, livens up his role considerably and Radha Mitchell, as Pita's anguished mother, has some strong scenes. Rachel Ticotin conveys a lot of warmth and tense concern as a Mexico City Veronica Guerin type and Giancarlo Giannini is persuasively world-wise as an investigator on the trail of the corrupt cops.

Scott plays with some techniques more associated with commercials and music videos than theatrical features, going back and forth between film and grainy video, sometimes subtitling phrases that are spoken in English as well as the Spanish dialogue. It's diverting but doesn't enhance our involvement with the story at hand. MAN ON FIRE feels long, and not just because it runs approximately two hours and 15 minutes. There is certainly existential tragedy in the tale of a man whose redemption and damnation become hopelessly entangled, but while MAN ON FIRE creates a picture of conflagration, we never feel it ignite.