Bill Skarsgård picks the wrong car to steal from in Locked, a fun example of simplified concept horror.
Eddie (Skarsgård) is behind on his child support, is behind on picking up his young daughter from school and doesn’t have the cash to pay for all of his van’s repairs. And, as a delivery person, he needs his van to work and pick up his daughter and make money to pay child support. To find the cash to cover repairs, he buys a few scratch-offs, he hits up unreceptive friends to borrow money (most of whom hang up on him) and then he nicks a wallet and starts trying the door handles of parked cars. The movie conveys that he’s not a bad guy per se — his thievery is nonviolent and when he’s barked at by a dog locked in one of the cars, he offers the hot pup some water. Then he sees a sleek SUV that is unlocked. He gets in, admires the car’s very lux interior but finding nothing worth stealing decides to leave. But he can’t; the doors are locked. Attempts to push open, kick out and even hit out the windows with a crowbar go nowhere. He even attempts to take a door apart, ignoring the constant ringing of the car’s built-in phone. Eventually, when attempts to call 911 or get the attention of someone walking by fail, he gives in and answers the phone. I am William (Anthony Hopkins) and this is my car, says the voice. And thus do days begin to pass — William can send an electrical shock through the seats, blast the air conditioner or the heat and play yodeling at full volume when Eddie upsets him. He berates Eddie for committing crimes, he rails against society, he drops information about a daughter who we gather was a victim of something worse than a car break-in. Eddie meanwhile tries everything to escape. He learns the hard way that the car is bulletproof. He eats what little food he has, he runs out of water, he fantasizes about a McDonald’s order. He argues with William about the economic inequality of the city, and pleads with William that he is sorry for his crimes. And he is horrified to learn that William can drive the car by autopilot.
Eddie is no dummy. His arguments with William go to a literary place about guilt and morality while William, a wealthy man and a doctor, is actually pretty “kids these days” and “this city has gone to seed.” Hopkins gives William a touch of Hannibal Lecter — sadistic and amoral even as he’s going on about justice. It’s a solid concept for a movie, well-executed and acted, and offers solid suspense and a kind of “hell is other people” horror. B Available for rent or purchase.
Havoc (R)
Tom Hardy is a cop with problems in Havoc, a movie that is 78 percent shooting.
So much shooting that it starts to take on a “heavy rainstorm” kind of white noise quality. This is Netflix, so if you fall asleep during the scene where one group of bad guys mows down another group of bad guys and then wake up during a scene when a third group of bad guys is mowing down them, you can always rewind. You can also not rewind because the who and why are kind of irrelevant to the point of these scenes, which is shooting.
Homicide detective Walker (Tom Hardy) is every single cliché of a TV or movie anti-hero — estranged from wife and child, living in a cruddy apartment, basically a walking mess of a person. He is mired in trauma from a thing that he and other detectives did that “went too far” and has caused his wife to refer to his offer of help as “blood money.” He grumps his way through his night shift, riding along with officer Ellie (Jessie Mei Li), a rookie who seems to find his Whole Thing off-putting.
Walker and Ellie are called to a massacre at a bad guy hangout where Walker learns that Charlie (Justin Cornwell), son of city developer and corrupt political guy Beaumont (Forest Whitaker), is one of the main suspects. Because of some security footage, the police think Charlie and his girlfriend Mia (Quelin Sepulveda) are responsible for mowing down the head of the local Chinese gang. Unfortunately for Charlie, the dead gang leader’s bad-ass mother (Yeo Yann Yann) also thinks he’s to blame. She and her efficient gang of killers are looking for him so Beaumont, who I guess has many police officers on his payroll, tells Walker to find and safeguard Charlie. Meanwhile, Walker’s fellow group of homicide detectives — played by two guys who aren’t Timothy Olyphant and one guy who is Timothy Olyphant — are also mixed up in the massacre, which is related to a shipment of drugs that were hidden in washing machines, one of which wound up being thrown on a cop car during a chase earlier in the movie.
But I’ve made it sound like there’s a lot of story here when really there are just little wisps of story and whole lots of shooting, with a thousand bullets fired for every one that hits somebody. And all of this is situated in a city that feels like the grimmest version of Gotham but without Batman or any costumed bad guys. And it’s at Christmastime, to make everything feel extra sad.
And yet, Tom Hardy almost, not really but almost, makes a good part of this work. He wears down-at-his-heels hopeless-guy well and makes you feel the guilt that his character drags around. C+ Streaming on Netflix.
