Sunday 24 August 2008

No.40 : Walking Tall (2004)




Walking Tall at the IMDb

The Rock comes home to his town and finds it a crap hole. He cleans house. Er. That’s it.

Well I never thought ‘Walking Tall’ would be plot heavy and I certainly wasn’t disappointed. It was quite good fun though, and at 73 minutes you could watch it while making love to a beautiful woman and still have an hour to fill.

The Rock is an ex-special forces man and heads home after 8 years away. The town looks perfectly nice but we know it’s a stink hole when he walks past a pawn brokers and a dirty book shop. He has a belligerent Dad who doesn’t like guns (remember that for later kids!) and a nephew who is about to go off the tracks.


He meets up with his pal Johnny Knoxville, who has a record and sleazy acquaintance Neil McDonough who inherited the good old mill only to close it and build a casino instead. Sounds like a solid business plan but The Rock doesn’t agree, possibly due to a lacklustre lap dance they give him. After getting conned at dice he wrecks the joint but is carved up by some baddies who bushwhack him - didn’t he learn anything in the WWF?

After his nephew nearly overdoses on casino brand drugs The Rock heads over and beats the crap out of everyone. Unsurprisingly he gets charged but in an OJ style verdict he not only gets off but elected sheriff too! When he goes after the casino boys they take umbrage and try to kill him, his family and his now girlfriend lap dancer. After some carnage the final showdown is arranged at the Old Mill which is now the Old Crack factory. Can our man win the day? Or will the baddies triumph with the aid of dirty tricks and a folding chair?

It’s hard to criticise ‘Walking Tall’ as it does what it says on the tin. Yeah, the shades of black and white are absolute and the violence ridiculous but it’s good snappy fun with a likeable cast of heroes and villains. Why the bad guy wants to run a rigged casino when he has a guaranteed money making machine anyway is anyone’s guess, but if it was me I’d let the guy try and roll a six - you’ll be ahead more often than not. The love interest was pretty forgettable but give her her dues, she looked fine shooting guns in her red bra.

The conclusion was a bit too pat for my liking with no real casualties on the good guys side and a wealth of lawsuits, no doubt lined up by the baddies’ many orphans. It’s a lot of old cobblers but at just over an hour it’s a fun load of old cobblers that you won’t regret having watched. Unless you’re one of those ‘I like quality films’ people, then you’d be disappointed.

Best Bit :Get me my plank!

‘W’ Score 15/23

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