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review by Luca Brasi
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Film
3000 Miles to Graceland Oh, this'll be great! A load of Hollywood stars carrying out a casino robbery dressed as Elvises! It's genius! It's great! It's... not... that good... Well, any film that starts off with a computer-generated fight between cartoonish scorpions already has problems and doesn't need any more. Someone apparently disagrees with me on that standpoint, and so the film is full of problems. All in all, this is a flawed, poorly scripted, but nonetheless entertaining film. On with the synopsis... if you recoil in disbelief, I don't blame you... two parolees (Kevin Costner and Kurt Russell), fresh from doing their jailhouse rock, plan a casino robbery during an Elvis convention, and so they and their team (David Arquette, Bokeem Woodbine and Christian Slater) each dress as Elvis in order to enter unnoticed. But after the devil-in-disguise Elvis's are finished takin' care o' business the plan starts to fall apart. On top of this mess, Kurt has a sweet thing going on with a down-on-her-luck Nevada (heartbreak) hotel owner (Courtney Cox), who seems to be infatuated with him from the first meeting. She likes him... and her son likes his wallet. The two of them really like the big bag of money Russell hides in one of her rooms... Anyway after a multitude of doublecrossings and predictable twists, it's Russel, Cox & son in one car being chased by the evil-evil-bad-man Costner in another car as each one tries to make it to the money launderer quicker. Along the way there's more than enough time for the odd bit of comic relief, wisecracking federal marshalls on their tail, subplots about hound dog Costner and the REAL Elvis, bonding between all-shook-up Russell & Cox's son and the gratuitous explosion of a petrol station. It looks silly when you read that. It's sillier on screen. But to tell the truth I was always wondering what would happen next, and that's alright. While Kurt & Courtney might not be that great as the main characters, Kevin Costner is strangely watchable as he plays the villain to his egotistical best. Christian Slater is the best of the Elvis gang, even though his role is smaller, and Howie Long(!) is great as Costner's right-hand man with the backup plan. So what did I think? Could have been a lot better, but could have been much worse. Sure, Courtney's a bimbo, Kurt's a nice bad guy, Kevin's evil and Christian is underused (and a far cry from the Elvis-loving hood from "True Romance"), but after all was said and done and blown up it turned out to be an alright film. Kurt's come a long way since he played Elvis in "The Elvis Presley Story", and it's hard to think this is the same boy who actually starred WITH Elvis in "It Happened at the World's Fair" (Ah, I love pointless trivia). So if you are lonesome tonight, or just bored, it's a good film to see, but I wouldn't make a mad rush to see it when there's so many better films to watch. Thank you very much. Viva Las Vegas! "Ladies and gentlemen... Luca has left the building..." |