The A-Team

No A For This Team
The A-Team, PG-13, *, Liam Neeson, Jessica Biel, Bradley Cooper, Sharlto Copely B.A. Quinton Jackson. 20th Century Fox film. Director Joe Carnahan. Length 121 minutes.
“The A-Team” is based on the old television series by the same name. I was not a fan of the series. Unfortunately, this movie version did not win me over.
The first hour gave me several laughs as Faceman Peck (Bradley Cooper) delivered sarcastic remarks while about to be burned at the stake. However, the stake is a group of tires, and he is tied up inside the tire stack. He has some funny lines, but about 45 minutes into the movie it all goes south.
Murdock (Sharito Copley) plays a mental case, but he knows how to fly airplanes. B.A. Baracus (Quinton Jackson) brings some humor to the movie with his straight forward talk and his reluctance to fly in an airplane. The leader of this wild and wooly team is Hannibal Smith (Liam Neeson). He is the brains behind the team and brings stability to their rambunctious attitudes.
The last half of the movie contains extreme over the top special effects and action. With cars, planes, tanks, motorcycles, and other modes of transportation, the audience gets more than enough of action sequences.
This kind of entertainment seems to be what many movie goers want to watch. However, without a little reality, it becomes increasing difficult to sit through this kind of amusement. Maybe Hannibal Smith had it right when he said, “Over kill is underrated.”
The viewer will not have to worry about having killed some brain cells in the past. It does not take any thought to sit through this exploitation of too much mêlée. With two hours of this destruction, the audience soon tires of obliteration without substance. In fact, I am getting tired thinking about it.
There are plenty of twists and turns in the movie. As the team spends some quality time in prison, some of them use this occasion wisely. Or at least a couple of them do.
One small highlight happens when Gandhi is quoted. The quotes are about his ideas about when to use violence.
Allow me to mention the best part of the movie. Charisa (Jessica Biel) is a tough soldier and extremely easy to look at. I am a big fan of Liam Neeson, but he is better than this. However, he probably wants to work in order to keep his mind occupied. Bradley Cooper is another actor that gives some good performances. Not sure why he chose this one.
Just when the exhausted audience thinks it is over, we get an opportunity to see that a sequel might be coming our way in the future. I will probably skip the next one.
Anyway this is one critic’s opinion. As they say, I am not sure who they are, “Everyone has an opinion.” As Gilda Radner would say, “Never Mind.”
If the viewer is a fan of “The A Team” stay until the credits are over. They have two short scenes at the end of the credits that might be of interest to some.