Review No.8: Rampart

A couple of year's ago I happened upon a film called The Messengers it didn't really do much box office here in the UK but it did get some awards buzz for Woody Harrelson who was nominated for Best Supporting Actor at the Oscars. In Rampart Harrelson is reunited with director Oren Moverman as well as co-stars Ben Foster and Steve Buscemi to play Dave Brown a Los Angeles Police Officer who is described as the last renegade police officer. Brown is involved in the infamous Rampart scandal in which many officers were accused and tried of various crimes including unprovoked beatings and shootings both of which we see Brown engage in throughout the film. Brown's notoriety has come through his gunning down of a man accused of being a serial date rapist and as a result he has been given the name Date Rape Dave something his elder daughter revels in calling him. Throughout the film Dave beats up someone who rams into his car and later stages being attacked to take the heat off of him trying to take money during an illegal card game. As the story progresses Dave's lies and his life start to unravel as he isn't able to manipulate people the way he used to do.

The main problem with Rampart was that I never really warmed to the character of Dave who is someone that is constantly trying to get out of situations by bribing people or talking down to them and by his own admission doesn't like anybody. Harrelson was so great in The Messengers because he was part of a double act with Ben Foster but here Foster has a minor role and Woody is on the screen in almost every scene. He does a good job with what he's given but the script is riddled with stereotypes and tries to emulate the old noirish crime films of the 1970s but fails miserably. The moody lighting and mumbling characters only really works if the story is strong enough to back it up but I didn't really feel like that ever happened during Rampart. There are also some wildly miscast actors including Sigourney Weaver as Dave's police chief and Ice Cube as the man trying to bring him to justice. What I did like was Dave's relationship with his two daughters and I thought both Harrelson and the two young actresses were able to get across this complicated situation very well. But I never really warmed to Rampart because I found it slow-moving and very one dimensional which is a shame as I was really expecting to enjoy another film from the team behind The Messengers but this wasn't to be the case.

Verdict: Mainly down to Harrelson's performance this gets a 4/10