WASHINGTON — “No Escape” would have been a runaway action success 30 years ago, back when Sylvester Stalone stalked the Vietnamese jungle in “Rambo” (1985), Libyan terrorists chased Christopher Lloyd for plutonium in “Back to the Future” (1985) and East German terrorists hunted Bruce Willis atop a skyscraper in “Die Hard” (1988). Our hero-villain quotient was black-and-white.
But the world has changed a lot since then, bringing with it a more global perspective. If you don’t toe the line just right — like Paul Greengrass did with his Somali pirates in “Captain Phillips” (2013) — you’re bound to receive Molotov cocktails thrown by movie critics eager to shout “xenophobia.”
These early reports are exaggerated, as “No Escape” clearly tries to infuse a sense of balanced morality to this tricky territory. It almost pulls it off, thanks to riveting suspense filmmaking by the Dowdle Brothers, tautly-paced editing, a script with a heartfelt family dynamic and surprisingly serious turns by often comic actors — even if its flaws are baked in the cake from the premise.
Jack (Owen Wilson) and Annie Dwyer (Lake Bell) are American parents who bring their daughters (Sterling Jerins and Claire Geare) to a new overseas home in Southeast Asia. Suddenly, they find themselves caught in the middle of a political coup, whose militants execute every foreigner in sight, particularly the Americans. Turns out, Jack is a businessman who almost got rich by inventing some kind of water “valve,” making him a target by the Asian militants who insist the United States is exploiting their water supply — as explained by charismatic secret agent Hammond (Pierce Brosnan).
The film is at its best when it sticks to the powerful family dynamic of survival, similar to Ewan McGregor and Naomi Watts wading through a Thailand tsunami in “The Impossible” (2012).
Much of the credit belongs to the pleasantly surprising action-hero turns by Wilson and Bell, whether it’s Wilson in “Meet the Parents” (2000), “Zoolander” (2001), “The Royal Tenenbaums” (2001), “Wedding Crashers” (2005) and “Midnight in Paris” (2011); or Bell in “What Happens in Vegas” (2008), “It’s Complicated” (2009), “No Strings Attached” (2011) and “In a World” (2013). In “No Escape,” they fight for their children with the tenacity of Liam Neeson in “Taken” (2008).
We absolutely believe these two are a mother and father trying to protect their children, as Wilson tells a touching story about how his daughter was born, or as Bell looks at her daughter with heartbreak and tells her it’s OK to wet herself “just this one time” while the family is in hiding.
The film begins to buckle under its own weight when it tries to get political, hinting at some wider implications but never truly exploring them. We’re never quite sure which Asian country they’re in, what type of water valve Jack invented, why the family moved, and why exactly the militants are conducting the coup — other than a brief speech by Brosnan about America’s imperialist footprint.
Rather than a serious statement on globalization, these vague story elements seem more like generic excuses to spark the action, and the intentional ambiguity weakens any sort of political commentary.
This is precisely why some critics are slamming the film for alleged xenophobia, claiming it presents the Asian antagonists as vicious killers hunting the innocent Caucasian protagonists.
I’m willing to give the sibling filmmakers — John Erick Dowdle and Drew Dowdle — the benefit of the doubt, as they try to insert human moments that cross cultures: the daughter waving to an Asian child as they arrive in town; the array of nationalities fleeing to the hotel rooftop; a militant marcher showing grace during a protest march; a local taking the family in for hiding; and the family’s overall quest to seek sanctuary in a friendly Vietnam. It’s “Apocalypse Yesterday.” The irony. The irony.
This thematic territory is a tough needle to thread. Michael Cimino won Best Picture for “The Deer Hunter” (1978) by having the Viet Cong torture Robert DeNiro and Christopher Walken, while Ben Affleck won Best Picture for “Argo” (2012) by having Iranians storm the U.S. Embassy in Tehran.
“No Escape” is hardly on the level of those masterful flicks, but it continues to prove how careful Hollywood must be in portraying American protagonists at the mercy of antagonists on foreign soil. At the very least, the Dowdles deserve credit for their filmmaking craft, sculpting undeniable suspense around the somewhat questionable premise. Their unabashed style damn near pulls it off.
★ ★ 1/2
The above rating is based on a 4-star scale. See where this film ranks in Jason’s Fraley Film Guide. Follow WTOP Film Critic Jason Fraley on Twitter @JFrayWTOP.
