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It would seem a spoiler to reveal just what the book is and why it’s so important, although anyone who has given the marketing half a glance shouldn’t be terribly surprised. Along the lines, it’s pertinent to point out that Eli is a film about faith that asks viewers for increasing leaps of it between fights and explosions. It’s compelling in the sense that Denzel makes for a mighty cool badass, and that the Hughes Brothers (who haven’t been behind the camera since 2001’s From Hell) are keen on milking both him and the stark landscape for all they’re worth, framing their lead in silhouette for his first brawl and keeping the camera roving as he fluidly dispatches many more foes to follow.

It’s mighty derivative, though, happy to wear its influences on its sleeve but reluctant to fully engage the considerable ideas that it brings to the table. Eli is our force for good, protecting what is presumed to be the last known copy of Text X, and more than anyone, literate local leader Carnegie (Gary Oldman) wants to get his hands on it and allow its message to do his bidding (although, so far as things are established, he’s not having any trouble controlling people with fresh water as it is). Still, we need a baddie, and one can do worse than hire Oldman; mind you, he’s also done better, but there’s only so much to work with here.

Once Carnegie’s stepdaughter, Solara (Mila Kunis, sincere but so clean), decides to tag along with Eli on his crusade, Carnegie and his second-in-command (Ray Stevenson) give chase, and what started out as something mysterious grows a bit more monotonous, and even a lively assault on a once-picturesque home can’t prevent the film’s climax from running out of steam just when stakes should be at their highest and then unleashing a series of twists that left me a little surprised and a lot skeptical.

'The Book of Eli' does have an admirable conviction to its beliefs, though, a rare quality to see in any big-budget actioner. But it’s more ambiguous than it is important, armed with ideas but afraid to use them. So far as post-apocalyptic westerns go, this one’s pretty watchable, but when our hero laments a bygone time when “we had more than we needed,” you wonder if he really even has enough to stand out in this crowded subgenre of desolation and determination.

link directly to this review at https://www.efilmcritic.com/review.php?movie=19079&reviewer=409
originally posted: 01/16/10 15:58:09
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