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| Jason Statham as Chev Chellios in Crank (2006) |
Boasting guns
showdown and nudity galore Crank
(2006) was made on a modest $12 million budget and turned into an action
phenomenon by grossing $42.9 million that guaranteed a 2009 sequel. We take a
look at both of them.
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Crank (2006) poster
Crank
(2006)
Following a
high-profile job he shouldn’t have performed, professional hit-man Chev
Chellios (Jason Statham, no introduction needed) is in the form of revenge
injected with a dodgy Chinese drug, which gives him a slow death that will last
less than a day, unless he keeps his adrenaline pumping and slow it down, and
he does so in spades by going on a binge to find the perpetrators while all
hell breaks loose.
Written and
directed by the credited Neveldine/Taylor team (the Mark Neveldine and Brian
Taylor duo) this is considered an action classic now, but it hasn’t aged too well
visually as it was shot on video and the image looks rubbish now even to the
most untrained pair of eyes. It lives up to its title though as the rock and
metal soundtrack is cranked up to 11 and the music video-like editing is
bombastic, to say the least, even if it looks like a bad copy of Quentin
Tarantino film, at times.
It is
essentially the high octane action version of Run Lola Run (1998) and it is salvaged by some very clever dialogue
and its overall edginess as we see the ‘down and dirty’ protagonist snorting
cocaine and dismembering his opponents. The problem though is that most of its
humour seems very ‘politically incorrect’ these days and could be accused of
homophobia and/or racism.
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Crank: High Voltage (2009)
Crank:
High Voltage (2009)
This time around
the Chinese threat comes to Chev Chellios (returning Jason Statham) in the form
of another high-profile Triad gangster that steals his heart (as in the vital
organ) and transplants it to himself with the aid of some dodgy medical
operation. The hero has very few hours to live with his artificial replacement
organ and in order to make some time for himself and prolong his foreseeable
death he must keep pumping high voltage adrenaline to himself, which he does in
spades in the means of shootouts and car crashes.
The Neveldine/Taylor
writing and directing duo return with this crazier and more expensive sequel
(it was budgeted at $20 million), maintaining the bombastic rock soundtrack and
the frenetic editing, but the action has become more comedic, so much in fact
that it is bordering on Troma-type features (even Lloyd Kaufman and Ron Jeremy
provide cameo appearances). The critics didn’t get a chance to see it (advance
screenings were not made available, somewhat understandably so) but the fans
loved it and it went on to gross $34.6 million, so the fact that we never saw
another sequel (even a straight-to-video one) is strange.
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