• Share

Contraband is a film about a former smuggler, Chris Farraday (Mark Wahlberg) who has decided to give up his life of crime in order to settle down with his wife, Kate (Kate Beckinsale) and two kids. At least, this is the plan until Kate’s mischievous younger brother, Andy (Caleb Landry Jones) decides to run drugs for a local dealer named Tim Briggs (Giovanni Ribisi). Andy screws up the job and a very irate Tim Briggs threatens Andy’s family if he’s not compensated for his loss. Chris is forced to come out of retirement and do one last job to pay off Briggs and avoid any harm to his family.

He Said:
I’ll admit that I wasn’t a huge fan of this film. I’ll start off with the good. The movie was suspenseful. There were several tense moments that had you on the edge of your seat. However, the movie just felt like a glorified version of Gone in 60 Seconds. It just seemed like the same story where the main character used to live a life of crime, but tried to straighten out his act until relative X gets in trouble for doing something similar and the main character must come out of retirement to bail out relative X. I don’t know how many times this type of story has been done, but it seems like a lot. So, right off the bat, I lost some interest. In a way, it was a bit of a disappointment after Wahlberg’s last stunning film, The Fighter. Because the movie is action-packed and exciting, I feel like it would be a good one to see if you had nothing else to do and wanted to be entertained for a couple hours.

My Rating: Wait until DVD/BLU-RAY.

She Said:
I was really looking forward to seeing this movie, mainly because I enjoy most of Mark Wahlberg’s film choices. I first noticed Marky Mark in The Perfect Storm and Planet of the Apes. He earned a spot in my “likeable leading man” category when I saw him in Rock Star. So, while I didn’t expect Contraband to be a cinematic masterpiece, I was hoping it had a little more depth than the trailer indicated. Unfortunately it didn’t.

Contraband is another regurgitation of a familiar Hollywood plot line – former criminal goes straight but gets pulled back into the business for one reason or another. Yawn. The plot tries to be too complex, the visual effects are boring (seriously, a freighter crashing into a dock? Who cares?), and it felt like Wahlberg and Kate Beckinsale were on autopilot throughout the entire movie. In fact, I have a hard time understanding why Beckinsale was even cast in her role; talk about a waste of talent.

Overall, I was supremely disappointed with the movie. The only thing that I really enjoyed about it was the sweeping panoramic views of Panama and New Orleans. In retrospect, we probably should have stayed home and rented a couple of tourism videos – they would have been better.

My Rating: Don’t bother