No Way Back Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		1.0
Video		2.5
Audio		2.0
Extras		0.0
Overall		1.5

No Way Back Blu-ray Movie Review

In this case, it's "you snooze, you win."

Reviewed by Martin Liebman July 15, 2009

You know I once served a medium rare swiss steak to Patrick Stewart.

Speaking of good old Jean-Luc, an interesting question to present to Mr. Data might be to ask whether No Way Back has survived into the 24th century. No doubt the Enterprise's computer carries a wide array of motion pictures from centuries past. It could probably call up, or place crew members inside of (courtesy of the holodeck), such classics as Casablanca, The Godfather, and Becket. As vast as the computer's storage capacity may be, would it still waste space on late 20th century nonsense like No Way Back? Perhaps, if someone were interested in archiving a primo example of a movie that somehow manages to get everything wrong. From its head-scratching plot to insipid action sequences, it's amazing No Way Back has survived even into the 21st century.

Russell Crowe puts a new spin on 'Being John Malkovich.'

An FBI agent, a Yakuza crime boss, and an annoying airline stewardess walk onto a movie set. The result: No Way Back. The FBI agent, Zack Grant (Russell Crowe, Gladiator), has assigned a rookie (Kelly Hu) to a dangerous infiltration mission where she must collect information from a group of white supremacists. Unfortunately, she's got other plans, including a massacre and suicide-by-jump-while-covered-in-a-curtain (also known as "the easy way to cover up the fact that it's really a mannequin"). The botched mission leaves Grant with questions to answer and his own backside to cover. He heads to Japan to try and sort things out. There, he plays cards and later arrests a crime boss with a suspected connection to the massacre named Yuji (Etsushi Toyokawa). The clever Yuji manages to hijack the plane during the return trip home and ultimately escapes but is hunted down by Grant and a stewardess with whom he previously found himself locked in an epic battle of wits (not really) named Mary (Helen Slater). Adding to the tension of the plot is the fact that Grant's son has been kidnapped by a crime boss (Michael Lerner) who is connected to the Japanese mafia and is also the father of one of the massacred white supremacists.

Its only claim-to-fame the presence of a young and still generally unknown Russell Crowe, No Way Back is an otherwise completely derivative and wholly forgettable 90 minute snoozer that doesn't even capitalize on the unending barrage of clichés that make up its plot. The story revolves around a bust gone bad, a search for answers, and a kidnapped son, complete with random shootouts along the way. Yawn. As generic and predictable as they come, No Way Back often feels like it was conceived, written, directed, edited, and scored by a group of high school students with little more wherewithal than knowing how to get the camera rolling. This is truly underwhelming stuff, the movie packed with shots that resemble the sort of faux "highly stylized" compositions found in an average "Mystery Science Theater 3000" picture. Meanwhile, the movie somehow manages to deliver perhaps the dullest action scenes ever captured on film. Whether a shootout in a Japanese warehouse, a standoff with the FBI, or the not-so-thrilling conclusion, there's never an instance where the least bit of adrenaline begins to flow. There's no sense of danger, no tension, and certainly no surprises as the action plays out with the intensity of a T-Ball game. Adding insult to injury are plenty of continuity errors (Yuji's gun magically changes from a Beretta to a Sig Sauer at least twice during the film's final minutes) and the obvious presence of the same "one-of-a-kind" gun used by John Malkovich's character in the vastly superior In the Line of Fire (also from Sony Pictures).

No Way Back Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

No Way Back features a satisfactory but never at all impressive 1080p, 1.85:1-framed transfer. The transfer begins with some flagrant banding, crushing blacks, a soft focus, and below-average details. Fortunately, these problems don't dominate the transfer, but they do linger and pop up from time to time. Facial close-ups reveal little depth, texture, and detail, and several times there's some obvious blocking and banding as the transfer can't seem to adequately resolve the change in tone between skin and the rouge applied to a character's cheeks. The result is a chunky, unnatural look that distracts from the image. Colors are generally dull, but some of the harshest shades -- Helen Slater's bright red stewardess's uniform, for instance -- stand out like a sore thumb and dominate every frame in which they appear. On the whole, the image appears flat and lifeless. Heavy grain covers the majority of the picture. No Way Back in no way impresses from a visual perspective, but the transfer isn't unwatchable by any stretch of the imagination.

No Way Back Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

No Way Back limps onto Blu-ray with a paltry Dolby TrueHD 5.1 lossless soundtrack. Things start promisingly enough with some discrete and mostly clear effects scattered all over the soundstage as a group of thugs mercilessly beat an innocent in a tunnel, but that, unfortunately, represents the sonic highlight. Explosions absolutely fizzle and pack the wallop of those "Snappers" that children throw on the sidewalk on the 4th of July. Gunshots, too, sound muffled and completely underwhelming throughout. There's next to no low end anywhere in the track. When a jumbo jet conducts an emergency landing around the middle of the film, there's a noticeable absence of any sort of loud, realistic effect to go along with it. It's akin to the landing of a remote controlled airplane in an empty parking lot. Nothing about the track excites the senses, but considering that nothing about the movie excites the senses, either, the lackluster soundtrack doesn't come as much of a surprise. No Way Back does deliver adequate dialogue reproduction, easily the highlight of the experience.

No Way Back Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Only a generic BD-Live page and 1080p trailers for The International, The Da Vinci Code, Lakeview Terrace, S.W.A.T., 88 Minutes, Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, Felon, and Revolver are included with this release.

No Way Back Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Despite being a contender for "longest 90 minutes in the history of cinema," No Way Back is at least never pretentious. It is what it is, a lame B-level Action/Thriller with a bad score, wooden acting, generic characters, a recycled plot, terrible pacing, dull action scenes, and unimpressive direction. There's not a single redeeming quality to be found here, save for a brief conversation about "Star Trek" and the fact that it's so bad as to be laughably passable, at least until the pacing kills even that small shred of enjoyment. Sony's Blu-ray release is befitting the film. Featuring an average 1080p picture quality, an underwhelming soundtrack, and no movie-related supplements, this one is best left on the store shelf.