Paycheck
Joe Nguyen, staff writer
Dec. 31, 2003

When you’re going into a John Woo movie, there are two things that you can expect. 1) There will be a lot of action and 2) there will be explosions. That’s certainly the case for his latest movie, "Paycheck." Unfortunately, there wasn’t much else aside from that.

"Paycheck" is based off a short story written by Philip K Dick, also of "Minority Report" and "Blade Runner" fame. It centers on Michael Jennings (Affleck), a man who takes the technology of other companies and reverse engineers them for the corporation that pays him. Promptly after, his memory is wiped clean of the technology and his is given his paycheck. When the opportunity arises to cash in on an 8-figure paycheck, he jumps at the opportunity. Upon the completion of the project, his memory is wiped clean, but his payment is forfeited and an envelope filled with clues is the only thing that remains.

The first twenty-five minutes of the movie was really good. Jennings had an aura of coolness reverse engineering the Arc Company’s computer design and ultimately improving it. Pretty much, after Jennings goes on his three-year project the movie goes downhill. The plot was predictable and the dialogue did not flow in many parts.

Ben Affleck, Colm Feore, and Aaron Eckhart in John Woo's "Paycheck"

One of the bigger problems was the chemistry between Jennings and Rachel Porter (Uma Thurman). The conversations between the two characters were really awkward. It felt as if the relationship was being forced onto the two instead of flowing naturally. Plus the whole, “Do you believe in second chances” routine wore thin toward the end.

The multiple plot holes also got annoying. There is one scene were Shorty (Giamatti) runs away and there is no mention of him for a long time. Maybe I missed something, but there was another character in the movie that died and his importance wasn’t made clear at all.

One of the saving graces of this movie was the performance by Paul Giamatti. Whenever he was on screen, Giamatti brought life into the movie. His appearances in the movie were too few and far spread.

This is a very average action movie filled with some big explosions. There are a lot of dumb criminals that do some things that don’t make any sense, like scraping a car against a metallic tunnel while chasing Jennings. This is a movie that’s worth renting, but that’s about it. Here’s hoping that John Woo’s next movie, "Land of Destiny" with Chow Yun-Fat and Nicolas Cage, will have a better script than this one.

Joe gives "Paycheck":

Joe Nguyen is a staff writer for asiaXpress.com. You can reach Joe at joe@asiaxpress.com.

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