The final tally of producers on Carjacked, from co-producers on up to executive producers, is eighteen; eighteen individuals who must have seen potential in a first feature script from two unknown writers. Or perhaps it was landing the director , John Bonito, that inspired confidence, whose only other project was the WWE film The Marine, starring John Cena. Whatever it was that brought so many people to the table on this project, it was all an illusion. Carjacked is a truly bad film, and it’s hard to see how even on the page before production began, it was anything but.
Lorraine Burton (Maria Bello) is a single mom, after her “jarhead” hubby up and left. Together with her little son Chad (Connor Hill), she mumbles her way through the soap opera melancholy that is her life. With just a few bucks in her wallet, enough to put a mere $6 of gas in her tank, but still afford that clichéd pack of cigarettes she’s trying to kick, she stops at a gas station and leaves her son in the car. This happens just minutes after the opening scene in her group therapy where she talks about how her negligence nearly got her son killed in a ridiculously awful flashback scene that has Chad running outside in the middle of the night and nearly getting hit by an ice cream truck. Make sense? Not really. She gets back in the car and Roy (Stephen Dorff), a bank robber on the lam, is waiting in the back seat. So begins an action film that lacks action, an indie without substance, or a thriller without thrills. Which is it? Who knows.
From minute one, the film is near unwatchable. Maria Bello, whose undeniable talent electrified in The Cooler and A History of Violence, went wrong somewhere. How an actress of such caliber went from superb projects that allowed the actors to exercise their craft in a challenging, provocative narrative, to gigs replacing Rachel Weisz in the schlock-ridden threequel The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, or trying to carry a rehashed NYPD episodic that can’t help but fall under Mariska Hargitay’s SVU shadow, is a question for her representation. She’s damn good, but the decisions guiding her career are damn bad.
Stephen Dorff manages to fit in the world of Carjacked slightly better, making the most of the garbage lines he’s given. He does, however, have the lesser burden of playing the villain. Carrying a film as the sympathetic lead, Bello’s unfortunate duty, means you’re in a bad movie and you don’t get to have any fun. At least for Dorff, he’s in a bad movie but gets to play a bit. That said, his character is as flawed as every other aspect of this travesty. We’re meant to believe he’s merciless or, at minimum, threatening. And yet, Bello incapacitates him with an absurd scene that has her in a diner’s bathroom. She stays in way too long, with the cellphone he didn’t take from her, and only because she calls 411 instead of 911 does he "prevent" her from getting help. He peeks his head in the john after she’s out, and misses the message scrawled above his head. Nothing wrong with that beat, except that it’s never referenced again in the film. Just one more flaccid attempt at escalation. And why, over and over again, she doesn’t just grab her kid and scream, “He’s a kidnapper!” is beyond comprehension.
Finally, she comes up with the genius plan to have Chad go to the bathroom, the second time in five minutes. Roy doesn’t think twice and before he knows it, Chad is on a schoolbus with other children making an easy escape. And Bello just waits. She doesn’t run, or scream now that her kid’s in the clear. Nope, she just waits to get thrown in the trunk. Dumb.
Carjacked just isn’t worth 89 minutes. How it got made is a mystery not worth the time to solve. Just miss it.
BLU-RAY BONUS FEATURES
Only one, Carjacked: Behind the Scenes. Worth watching? Not a chance. If you make it through 89 minutes, the thought of anymore will be unconscionable.
"Carjacked" is on sale November 22, 2011 and is rated R. Thriller. Directed by John Bonito. Written by Sherry Compton, Michael Compton. Starring Connor Hill, Joanna Cassidy, Maria Bello, Stephen Dorff.
