BEFORE: OK, so we're not REALLY in the horror chain yet, it's something of a soft opening. There will be a couple more horror films in September, sure, but the OFFICIAL start is still October 1. Sort of. As with last year's Shocktober line-up, there might also be a couple non-horror films sneaking into October, just because it's getting harder and harder to keep the chain alive - sometimes I have to program a movie JUST for the linking, and it may not fit with the theme. It's OK, breathe, everything's going to work out. There's a clear path to Christmas, which is only 50 movies away, as of this writing. OK, 96 days, but only 50 movies - I've got to get through New York Comic-Con, a vacation, Halloween and Thankgiving first.
But there are 11 days left in September after today, and 8 movies - no problem. Taraji P. Henson carries over again from "Muppets Haunted Mansion".
THE PLOT: A guy wanted around town by various hitmen hopes to stay alive long enough for his life insurance policy to kick in and pay out for his estranged daughter.
AFTER: I was sort of dreading this one, because the title and the plot synopsis on IMDB led me to believe that the insurance policy bought by the lead character was going to be a MUCH bigger part of the plot, when in fact it turned out to only be a thing that happened, at one point early in the film, professional heist-planner Nick Barrow realizes that his life is in danger, and so he goes to an insurance office and purchases a policy, one which will provide for his daughter in the event that he gets killed. Well, geez, I thought, I think I know how this is going to play out, now, this character's a goner for sure. Then when the insurance agent mentioned that it could take two weeks for the company to review his policy and approve it, I figured, that confirms it, he's dead for sure, and the film will end with the insurance company agreeing that the policy really kicked in the moment that he signed the policy, not after they reviewed and approved it. Yeah, that's not the way the plot went, which means that the world is STILL waiting for the breakthrough insurance policy-based Hollywood action movie. WHEN, I ask you?
This is really about family, about a father dealing with his daughter after he basically kidnaps her to save her life, and they have to go on the run together. It's a chance for her, once she gets over the shock of being abducted, to maybe get to know her father for the first time, and learn valuable life lessons, like how to plan an exit strategy when planning to pull off a heist at a suburban bakery shop. Hey, when you really need pastries, they're not going to steal themselves. But also, her father knows valuable things like how to blend into a crowd and not get noticed, when to change hotels when you're on the run, and how to beat the carnival games at a fair. I'm not kidding, that's some valuable stuff, those games are rigged six ways to Sunday.
However, arguing with the carnies brings him to the attention of the local sheriff, at a time when they're supposed to be staying OFF the radar of the police in Georgia. It all goes back to a bunch of dirty cops in Atlanta who took some protection money, and in order to make the case go away, they hired Nick through a third party to plan a heist of the dirty money from the police evidence locker, because if there's no money, there's no case. Nick sub-contracted the work out to a couple of up-and-coming thieves, who were then promptly killed by the dirty cops, just so they could burn the money. Jeez, why didn't they just steal the money themselves? Ah, because they're not a master planner like Nick is.
There was a whole bunch of these movies a few years back, movies about people who could "read the room" and calculate the best way to take down multiple enemies, use the geography of their surroundings to their advantage, and usually end up shooting one bad guy with another bad guy's gun. "John Wick" was one of those movies that used this as a plot device, and "Batman v Superman" was another. "Term Life" was released in 2016, the same year as "Batman v Superman", so yeah, that was definitely a trend.
But Nick's been at this heist thing for a long time - what's a lot less believable is that a few quick life lessons from him would turn his daughter into ANOTHER master planner type, over the course of just a few weeks in hiding with her dad. Maybe she's got that hyper-focus thing, whatever the opposite of ADD is, and she learns super-fast, I don't know. All I know is that when she was in the "Hawkeye" TV show they had to make sure her character already had a background in archery, because no way can you pick up a skill like that over the course of just a few episodes. Since Kate Bishop grew up in a wealthy family, of course she'd have studied gymnastics, fencing and archery, so boom, there you go, instant superhero, almost.
This is not a terrible film, I've seen much, much worse - but "Term Life" is notorious for receiving a 0% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, which seems a bit misguided and spiteful. The most negative thing I can say about is that Jon Favreau wasn't in the film long enough for this to count as a true "Swingers" reunion. (Yeah, if you want to feel old, go back and watch "Swingers" again and think about how young Favreau and Vaughn were.). The director of this film was Peter Billingsley, who you probably know from "A Christmas Story" and cameos in Marvel movies, but that in itself does not a bad movie make. It's also a bit of a waste just to cast Taraji P. Henson as an insurance agent for two minutes, but whatever - that's not an unforgivable sin, either. Clearly America was demanding more insurance-based plot points, right? That must be it.
For me, I really wanted to get to two other Vince Vaughn films, "Freaky" - which kind of would work on the Halloween theme since it's about someone switching bodies with a serial killer - and "Dragged Through Concrete", but unfortunately, there's no time. I've got to move on in a different direction if I'm going to complete the chain this year, and so any movie not currently programmed has to wait until 2023, at least. This is a terrible time of year for me, because I'm locked in and I can't deviate from the program, like I could drop in films at whim in January or April, and the chain would recover - man, those were the days....
Also starring Vince Vaughn (last seen in "Lay the Favorite"), Hailee Steinfeld (last seen in "Charlie's Angels" (2019)), Bill Paxton (last seen in "Listening to Kenny G"), Jonathan Banks (last seen in "Freejack"), Jordi Molla (last seen in "Colombiana"), Terrence Howard (last seen in "Movie 43"), Shea Whigham (last seen in "This Must Be the Place"), Jon Favreau (last seen in "Spider-Man: No Way Home"), William Levy (last seen in "Girls Trip"), Mike Epps (last een in "Acts of Violence"), Cain Velasquez, Rio Hackford (also last seen in "Lay the Favorite"), Annabeth Gish (last seen in "Mystic Pizza"), Brian F. Durkin (last seen in "The Highwaymen"), James Paxton (last seen in "The Greatest Game Ever Played"), Manuel Garcia-Rulfo (last seen in "6 Underground"), Brent Briscoe (last seen in "The Killer Inside Me"), Peggy Sheffield, Javier Carrasquillo (last seen in "Freelancers"), Jose Miguel Vasquez (last seen in "Black Widow"), Fernando Martinez, Aerli Austen, Joshua Mikel (last seen in "Greenland"), Morganna Bridgers (last seen in "The Devil All the Time"), Griffin Freeman (last seen in "The Birth of a Nation"), Ian Gregg (last seen in "Zombieland: Double Tap"), Terri Abney (last seen in "Loving"), Danna Maret, Derek Roberts (last seen in "Geostorm"), Kate Forbes, Tracye Hutchins, Rebekka Schramm Moorer, Matthew Willig (last seen in "Birds of Prey"), Tait Fletcher (last seen in "The Harder They Fall"), Travis Johns, Daniel Bernhardt (last seen in "Red Notice"), Cécile de France (last seen in "The French Dispatch"), Bryan Basil, Carlos Aviles (last seen in "Boss Level"), Georgy Fontanals.
RATING: 6 out of 10 car alarms going off at once
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