Déjà vu (2006)

 ☆ ☆ ☆

Déjà vu (2006) – T. Scott

A Jerry Bruckheimer-produced Tony Scott film.  Is there anything more to say than that?  Maybe. I usually avoid these noisy expensive blockbusters, finding them all spectacle and little plot or character development.  Of course, if you get a star with a known personality, such as Denzel Washington, they can add their usual traits and style to the proceedings, as happens here.  But what really drew me to the film (which I had never heard of before) was that it was grouped together with other films about time and memory by the Criterion Channel (sadly available only in the US), including such amazing films as Vertigo, Twelve Monkeys, Memento, and Mullholand Dr. So, I took the risk and, yes, like those other films, it turned out to be rather mind-bending (although as most reviewers suggested at the time, also preposterous).  This film, shot in 2005, also focuses on terrorism (a bomb is planted on a ferry carrying US servicepeople and civilians) and takes place in an immediately post-Katrina New Orleans.  Thinking about how the US felt this close to 9-11 and this terrible disaster adds another odd resonance to the film – but is it terrorism-porn?).  Washington plays an ATF agent called in to investigate the bombing and help track down the culprit.  This far in, the film is a by-the-numbers disaster film with fast cutting and death/destruction.  But then FBI agent Val Kilmer invites Washington to join an elite team with access to a very high-tech surveillance system that allows them to view actions in the past from any conceivable angle in any location (within a set radius that can be extended by using a portable headset) – the kicker is that they can only observe things 4 days in the past, because the system takes a long time to render the data from all available camera sources.  Washington asks the right questions (how do they get the audio?) but receives no answers.  This is very high concept stuff and to the extent that you can hold onto the thread, you’ll enjoy the movie.  It is part action thriller and part (creepy) romance, not to mention sci-fi.  But just don’t try to apply logic to the ending because it just might not make sense (although it might bust your brain to figure that out).