'BASTILLE DAY' which I saw on Friday evening, for the historians amongst us, will know the significance of 14th July to the French - for it is Bastille Day, marking the date in 1789 when troops stormed The Bastille - a medieval fortress and prison in Paris. It was an important event marking effectively the beginning of the French Revolution. It wasn't until 1880 however, that it officially became a national public holiday, and has as such been celebrated every year since then with great fan fare. So, history lesson over, what about this film which mirrors recent tragic terrorist events in Paris with the January 2015 Charlie Hebdo Offices bombing and that of a Jewish supermarket, and then the more widespread and tragic Stade de France attacks in St. Denis and the Bataclan Theatre attack in November 2015. The similarities with this films central theme are inevitable, but in reality sheer coincidence as filming took place before those events in late 2014, with the movie in the can by Christmas that year. All that said,
'Bastille Day' is Directed by James Watkins, and stars Idris Elba in the main lead doing all he can to prove that he might be a shoe-in for James Bond when Daniel Craig sips his last shaken not stirred Martini.
The films open up on the eve of Bastille Day, with the city well advanced in its celebratory preparations for the national holiday. Working the streets is an American pick-pocket Michael Mason (Richard Madden) doing a very nice job of stealing wallets, smart phones, expensive watches and passports from unsuspecting tourists and passers-by out on a summer's evening enjoying the festivities. With his evenings stash he makes his way to his 'fence' and he exchanges his evenings collection for cash, and then slinks away into the night for a quiet refreshment in a nearby Cafe. Across the city from his offices overlooking the Eiffel Tower is CIA Agent Sean Briar (Idris Elba) pondering what the next 24 hours will bring as the city swings into full on party mode.
Siting there minding his own business in quiet reflection, Mason spies a distraught woman, Zoe Neville (Charlotte Le Bon) with a carrier bag - she removes her blond wig and stuffs it into the bag, and holds her head in her hands sobbing. An easy target thinks Mason, and while she sits on a step not paying attention he's in there, bag removed and on his way. In a side street out of view he rummages through the bag to see what he can find - a cuddly toy bear, the blond wig, a mobile phone, and other sundry paraphernalia. Nothing much - he stuffs the bear back in and the wig, holds onto the phone and makes his way back to the Cafe precinct from whence he came, depositing the bag in the garbage bin as he goes. Within a few seconds, the garbage bin explodes and the street is strewn with debris, and bodies - four dead! Mason gets to his feet, grabs the phone and makes off, stunned by what just happened, and not before being caught on CCTV. Within no time, Briar is on the case, the prime suspect in this terror attack is identified, tracked down and brought in for questioning but not before a roof top foot chase that comes to rest in a busy market - the like of which you seen in a hundred other movies of this ilk, but it is reasonably well handled nonetheless.
Cue the unofficial safe house interrogation room and Briar and Mason are nose to nose with Briar coming on strong as the tough take no prisoners kinda guy, and Mason as the in out of his depth WTF just happened I'm just a wannabe Med student trying to make a fast buck to pay my way through college low life loser. Pretty soon, the city goes into lock down and Briar realises that Mason is probably telling the truth and he is just a patsy caught up in this mess unawares. So Briar decides to use the pick-pocket to track down Zoe using the phone that Mason stole, and which is all they have to go on. And so begins another hunt, another chase and more truths revealed that only add to this web of intrigue as the two unlikely partners now chase all over Paris.
While all of this is going on Briar's superior officer Karen Dacre (Kelly Reilly) is monitoring the unfolding scenario back at CIA HQ in downtown Paris and is in contact with long term friend and counterpart in the French authorities Victor Gamieux (Jose Garcia). He has a hidden agenda and enlists the RAPID Team (a seemingly elite special forces arm of the police) with his full authority to track down the alleged terrorist and Zoe, for fear that their plan may come undone - and the boys from RAPID are in on the game with a huge pay day coming their way if their rigorously detailed plans come off. Its up to Briar, Mason and Neville to uncover the further plot twists as they go, playing the inevitable cat & mouse game across Paris as the hunters becomes the hunted, and then vice versa.
Meanwhile the RAPID guys are inciting unrest amongst the masses and manufacturing scenes of police brutality that they post all over social media encouraging unrest, rioting in the streets, looting, random acts of violence and holding the authorities to ransom on the day of celebration. They use hashtags to get their messages across whilst creating a smokescreen for their plan to be executed - to rob the national bank of US$500M in plain sight and with the full authority from the government, represented here by Gamieux. But of course they didn't count on the machismo of Briar and the sleight of hand of Mason to thwart their plans when they least expect it, and with the help of thousands of Parisians who help turn the tables unexpectedly.
Of course, before they get to this point, there's more shoot 'em up, beat 'em down bravado in the back of a truck, which again, you've seen a hundred times before, but also reasonably well handled. In the end, good overcomes evil, a few more people get killed - both good and bad, and the mastermind behind all of this gets locked up, and the aspiring Med student decides that a job in the CIA may not be such a bad option after all, given his one and only successful track record in bringing down a major crime, capturing the king pin and preventing a shit storm on Bastille Day.
On the positive, the film moves along at a good pace and for its short running time of 92 minutes you won't get bored and it is entertaining enough. But, this is everything you would expect it to be - formulaic, plot holes that you could drive a truck through, implausible story and it really contains nothing you have not seen before in Bourne and Bond (roof top foot chase sequences and close quartered hand to hand combat),
'V for Vendetta' (a masked population rising up against authority driven by one man) and
'Die Hard' (create an intricate smokescreen to commit a robbery). You don't need to see this on the big screen, and can easily wait for the DVD and Bluray release.
-Steve, at Odeon Online-
'BASTILLE DAY' which I saw on Friday evening, for the historians amongst us, will know the significance of 14th July to the French - for it is Bastille Day, marking the date in 1789 when troops stormed The Bastille - a medieval fortress and prison in Paris. It was an important event marking effectively the beginning of the French Revolution. It wasn't until 1880 however, that it officially became a national public holiday, and has as such been celebrated every year since then with great fan fare. So, history lesson over, what about this film which mirrors recent tragic terrorist events in Paris with the January 2015 Charlie Hebdo Offices bombing and that of a Jewish supermarket, and then the more widespread and tragic Stade de France attacks in St. Denis and the Bataclan Theatre attack in November 2015. The similarities with this films central theme are inevitable, but in reality sheer coincidence as filming took place before those events in late 2014, with the movie in the can by Christmas that year. All that said, 'Bastille Day' is Directed by James Watkins, and stars Idris Elba in the main lead doing all he can to prove that he might be a shoe-in for James Bond when Daniel Craig sips his last shaken not stirred Martini.
The films open up on the eve of Bastille Day, with the city well advanced in its celebratory preparations for the national holiday. Working the streets is an American pick-pocket Michael Mason (Richard Madden) doing a very nice job of stealing wallets, smart phones, expensive watches and passports from unsuspecting tourists and passers-by out on a summer's evening enjoying the festivities. With his evenings stash he makes his way to his 'fence' and he exchanges his evenings collection for cash, and then slinks away into the night for a quiet refreshment in a nearby Cafe. Across the city from his offices overlooking the Eiffel Tower is CIA Agent Sean Briar (Idris Elba) pondering what the next 24 hours will bring as the city swings into full on party mode.
Siting there minding his own business in quiet reflection, Mason spies a distraught woman, Zoe Neville (Charlotte Le Bon) with a carrier bag - she removes her blond wig and stuffs it into the bag, and holds her head in her hands sobbing. An easy target thinks Mason, and while she sits on a step not paying attention he's in there, bag removed and on his way. In a side street out of view he rummages through the bag to see what he can find - a cuddly toy bear, the blond wig, a mobile phone, and other sundry paraphernalia. Nothing much - he stuffs the bear back in and the wig, holds onto the phone and makes his way back to the Cafe precinct from whence he came, depositing the bag in the garbage bin as he goes. Within a few seconds, the garbage bin explodes and the street is strewn with debris, and bodies - four dead! Mason gets to his feet, grabs the phone and makes off, stunned by what just happened, and not before being caught on CCTV. Within no time, Briar is on the case, the prime suspect in this terror attack is identified, tracked down and brought in for questioning but not before a roof top foot chase that comes to rest in a busy market - the like of which you seen in a hundred other movies of this ilk, but it is reasonably well handled nonetheless.
Cue the unofficial safe house interrogation room and Briar and Mason are nose to nose with Briar coming on strong as the tough take no prisoners kinda guy, and Mason as the in out of his depth WTF just happened I'm just a wannabe Med student trying to make a fast buck to pay my way through college low life loser. Pretty soon, the city goes into lock down and Briar realises that Mason is probably telling the truth and he is just a patsy caught up in this mess unawares. So Briar decides to use the pick-pocket to track down Zoe using the phone that Mason stole, and which is all they have to go on. And so begins another hunt, another chase and more truths revealed that only add to this web of intrigue as the two unlikely partners now chase all over Paris.
While all of this is going on Briar's superior officer Karen Dacre (Kelly Reilly) is monitoring the unfolding scenario back at CIA HQ in downtown Paris and is in contact with long term friend and counterpart in the French authorities Victor Gamieux (Jose Garcia). He has a hidden agenda and enlists the RAPID Team (a seemingly elite special forces arm of the police) with his full authority to track down the alleged terrorist and Zoe, for fear that their plan may come undone - and the boys from RAPID are in on the game with a huge pay day coming their way if their rigorously detailed plans come off. Its up to Briar, Mason and Neville to uncover the further plot twists as they go, playing the inevitable cat & mouse game across Paris as the hunters becomes the hunted, and then vice versa.
Meanwhile the RAPID guys are inciting unrest amongst the masses and manufacturing scenes of police brutality that they post all over social media encouraging unrest, rioting in the streets, looting, random acts of violence and holding the authorities to ransom on the day of celebration. They use hashtags to get their messages across whilst creating a smokescreen for their plan to be executed - to rob the national bank of US$500M in plain sight and with the full authority from the government, represented here by Gamieux. But of course they didn't count on the machismo of Briar and the sleight of hand of Mason to thwart their plans when they least expect it, and with the help of thousands of Parisians who help turn the tables unexpectedly.
Of course, before they get to this point, there's more shoot 'em up, beat 'em down bravado in the back of a truck, which again, you've seen a hundred times before, but also reasonably well handled. In the end, good overcomes evil, a few more people get killed - both good and bad, and the mastermind behind all of this gets locked up, and the aspiring Med student decides that a job in the CIA may not be such a bad option after all, given his one and only successful track record in bringing down a major crime, capturing the king pin and preventing a shit storm on Bastille Day.
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