Movie Review: "Knight And Day"

Looking back at my trailers journal (yes, I keep a trailers journal...I told you I was a geek), two of the trailers I saw the most this year (often times together) were "Killers" and "Knight And Day". What's funny about this is the two movies seem oddly similar. A beautiful, all-smiles blonde woman being wooed by a hunky brown-haired gentleman who turns out works for some unnamed government agency, giving our hunky piece of eye candy a licence to kill.

Now, let's face it. "Killers" looked like shit. I can't recall the last time either Katherine Heigel or Ashton Kutcher made a film worth watching since it's become more than apparent that neither Heigel nor Kutcher can act. Just like the reasons I've been hesitant and apprehensive about seeing such franchises like "Star Wars", "The Fast and the Furious" and "Step Up", I don't care how "pretty" the cast is or how "magnificant" the special effects and/or choreography is. If the acting is crap and the writing is mediocre, you will not see my ass in the theater.

With "Knight And Day", everything seemed to click in the right places. Great cast, great writing, great director, great plot. Everything.

From the first moments of the film, where you see Roy Miller (Tom Cruise) biding his time at the airport looking for that "special someone", you can hear the wheels turning. What is he looking for? Why is he at the airport to begin with? These questions are answered (or at least differed for the time being) by the entrance of June Havens (Cameron Diaz), a plucky mechanic's daughter bringing miscellaneous car parts home to finish a pet project of hers. And, in typical romantic comedy fashion, Roy and June bump into each other (twice) and wind up on the same flight together. What happens next is a series of bizarre occurrences involving several dead passengers, 2 dead pilots, and a plane crash. Much bigger than what I can imagine "Killers" started out with.

What really sets "Knight And Day" truly apart from "Killers" is one question: What is real? June is soon approached by two agents (Viola Davis and Peter Sarsgaard), telling June that Roy went "rogue" after developing a dissociative disorder, believing that the elaborate story Roy told her is actually real. But June is watching the events unfurl, causing her to wonder if they really are or not. Much like the last Cruise and Diaz, 2001's "Vanilla Sky", nothing is ever clear as to what is really going on, leaving the question in tact until the final moments of the movie. Isn't it always better when the filmmakers have enough respect for the audience to do that?

Director James Mangold ("3:10 To Yuma", "Identity", "Walk The Line"), who also co-wrote the film), understands what makes a good movie, and knew exactly how to make the film both comedic and intense -- more than likely because he's had extensive experience in both fields.

What really made this movie for me was Tom Cruise's ability to mask his thoughts, making it damn near impossible to figure out what Roy Miller is going to do next. You don't know whether he's going to kill everyone in the room using nothing but a single clip or if he just wants pie. And damn that signature Tom Cruise smile, which has 30 different meanings all at once, making Roy more of an enigma. He's not just hunky...he's dangerous.

And let's not forget to mention Cameron Diaz. For the first time since her debut in "The Mask", Diaz plays it "straight", playing perfectly off of Cruise, making them this summer's best comedic duo thus far, only slightly behind Russell Brand and Jonah Hill in "Get Him To The Greek". Unlike her last comedic performance in 2008's "What Happens In Vegas" (which, almost serendipitously featured Ashton Kutcher), instead of tyring to one-up her costar, Diaz works with Cruise to make the dialogue snappy and the jokes fluid.

FINAL VERDICT: The perfect marriage between "Kate and Leopold" and "The Bourne Identity", "Knight and Day" is funny and intense, psychological and stunning. Where others focus on cast, this film focuses on plot -- a rarity among comedies these days. Much less action comedies. Much MUCH less than romantic action comedies. When comparing it to "Killers", it's like...well, you get the idea.