S.W.A.T.

Who do the police call when they’re in trouble? Well they call S.W.A.T. of course, who else? The movie begins with a hostage situation gone wrong. A S.W.A.T. team member (Brian Gamble) disobeys orders, enters a bank and wounds a hostage. He and his partner Jim Street (Farrell) are offered demotions. Street accepts; his partner leaves the force. Street, a talented officer and a great shot, is spotted by the legendary veteran Hondo Harrelson (Jackson), and chosen for his hand-picked elite S.W.A.T. team.

A routine traffic stop leads to the unexpected arrest of Alex (Olivier Martinez), an internationally wanted fugitive. Alex offers a $100 million reward on television to anyone who frees him, and the cops assume there will be a lot of escape masterminds hoping to collect the reward. It's up to Hondo and his team to safely escort the prisoner to jail.

That it does not go smoothly goes without saying. However, in an era when so many action flicks are a mindless assaults on your intelligence, it works as something vaguely plausible and yet still entertaining. The director remains faithful to the conventions of the genre while sneaking in the occasional surprise to keep us off balance, which makes the film better than many of its kind, with performances being mostly serious, with dashes of humour thrown in for good measure. One of the best action movies of 2003; see it where it belongs - on the big screen.

Percival Tucker