THE A-TEAM

At The Movies: The A-Team

(Long Island, N.Y.) When I was a wee lad back in the 1980's, one of my favorite television shows was The A-Team; mainly, this was due to the character of "B.A. Baracus," played by the ultimate 80's tough-guy, Mr. T. Mr. T was a hero of mine growing up, second in my estimation only to the Austrian Oak himself, Arnold Schwarzenegger. I mean, everyone looks up to someone, and I often gravitated towards big, strong, larger-then-life characters who could effortlessly kick butt (this was probably due to the fact that I was a scrawny little wimp at the time). But as far as the A-Team went, it was a show that certainly had more going for it than just Mr. T pitying fools and then throwing said fools across a room and out a window; it had action, humor, and loads of personality. So it should come as little surprise that the merciless Hollywood remake machine is attempting to cash in on nostalgia for yet the billionth time by now bringing The A-Team to the big screen.

Remember the famous voice-over at the beginning of each episode of the original TV series that covered its backstory? Um...how did that go again?

"Ten years ago, a crack commando unit was sent to prison by a military court for a crime they didn't commit. These men promptly escaped from a maximum security stockade to the Los Angeles underground. Today, still wanted by the government, they survive as soldiers of fortune. If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them, maybe you can hire... The A-Team."

Oh, right, that's it. Anyway, that's what this movie is about: the crime they didn't commit, their prompt escape, and their attempt to clear their names. The 'soldiers of fortune helping the downtrodden by blowing up everything in sight' stuff that formed the basis of each and every weekly episode of the TV series is apparently being left for the eventual sequel. But hey, this approach ends up being a somewhat unique take on the subject matter- after all, the show started up with all the players already in place and doing their thing. Now, for the first time, we get to see how they actually met and became The A-Team: Col. John "Hannibal" Smith (Liam Neeson), Lt. Templeton "Faceman" Peck (Bradley Cooper), Sgt. B.A. "Bad Attitude" Baracus (Quinton "Rampage" Jackson), and Capt. H.M. "Howling Mad" Murdock (Sharlto Copley).

Here's the gist of it: once the hows of why the four meet are gotten out of the way (turns out they're all Army Rangers united by fate...or something), time fast-forwards to the end of the Iraqi war where The A-Team (as they've come to be known as), now considered elite combat unit, are given a top-secret "unofficial" assignment to steal back counterfeit U.S. treasury plates that are being moved out of Baghdad. However, upon successful completion of the mission, they are instead betrayed and charged with going rouge, with each member of the team sentenced to 10 years in the cooler. Naturally, our heroes are not inclined to take this injustice lying down, and with the help of a shady CIA operative named "Lynch" (Patrick Wilson), the four bust out of prison and set out to clear their names...mostly by shooting and blowing up everything they see. However, they are pursued by "Faceman" Peck's ex-girlfriend, Capt. Charisa Sosa (Jessica Biel), who apparently is apparently sore about the break-up and seems determined to even the score. And SHE dumped HIM! Women, huh?

Anyway, The A-Team's investigation ends up uncovering lies, conspiracies, backstabbings, hoodwinking, plots, shenanigans, tomfoolery, and just about any other word you can think of that would indicate that naughty people are trying to stack the deck against our fearless quartet. In the end it will not only take endless expenditure of ammunition and bombs to see that justice is done, but a fair amount of cunning and guile as well. Luckily, The A-Team has all of it in spades.

Directed by Joe Carnahan, known for the 2002 crime drama NARC and the 2007 action flick Smokin' Aces (which was my actually the subject of my second-ever review here at Long Island Exchange, and you could see the vast potential and talent of this brash young reviewer in every sentence), The A-Team is a fun movie starring a group of actors who display a great amount of chemistry and camaraderie with one another. The film is funny, fast-paced, never boring, and features several action scenes that, while bordering on the ridiculous, are still well-done and exciting. I'd say that the movie basically captures the action-packed and comedic tone of the TV show that inspired it pretty well...in other words, I didn't feel like a chunk of my youth was raped and pillaged like I did when I watched the recent G.I. Joe: The Rise Of Cobra. Of course, there was one major departure from the original series that even had Mr. T himself up in arms: in the TV program, no matter how many shots were fired or things blew up, no one EVER got killed. Like, ever. I mean, you'd see a horrific car crash and the camera would always take a second or two to show the drivers climb out, shaken but unhurt. It was solid family viewing; homogenized destruction without the unpleasant side-effects of death and suffering. But the PG-13 film adaptation forgoes the cartoon violence of its forefather and wastes no time in actually pumping bullet after bullet into bad guys instead of just aiming for the ground by their feet. It's actually not that jarring- the lack of any body count in the show was actually pretty silly considering the carnage unleashed each episode- and it's never morbid or gratuitous.

I'll get to the only part of this review that really matters now: how well the new actors fill the shoes of the original cast. Now, before I get to the individual performances, let me just say this: on the TV show, it was basically all about Mr. T. The A-Team itself was originally conceived as a starring vehicle for him and the whole show was built around his character. But one thing the movie does better than the show is that now the team seems much more like a family- I'm not sure if these actors just have a better rapport with each other or what, but their interaction just felt far more organic and natural than it ever did on the show. It also helps that each actor doesn't simply try to ape their respective 80's counterpart- instead they each infuse their roles with a bit of themselves as well.
As for the main cast, let's go in order:

Liam Neeson as Col. John "Hannibal" Smith:
My boy Liam does himself proud in the role first held by the late George Peppard. Mr. Neeson, an amazing actor with a long, illustrious career, has already proven himself a more than capable action star in 2008's Taken, a intense and blood-drenched favorite of yours truly (long-time readers will notice that I point this out at every opportunity I get). Neeson puts his own personal spin on the smug and scheming Hannibal, the grizzled leader of the group who has easily earned their loyalty a hundred times over. As soon as Neeson was announced for the role, I knew it was in safe hands. And I was right.

Bradley Cooper as Lt. Templeton "Faceman" Peck:
He's the pretty one, a con-man with a thing for the ladies. Cooper doesn't play the role as smarmy as Dirk Benedict did, but it's probably the one portrayal in this movie that strays the least from the mark. Still, they try and flesh him out a tad in regards to his relationship with Biel's character, and it kinda works to humanize him a little. Please don't mistake this as anything approaching character development; there's little of that in this movie. I'm just making conversation, is all.

Quinton "Rampage" Jackson as Sgt. B.A. "Bad Attitude" Baracus:
Now this is an interesting one, and probably the performance I'm the most conflicted about. To start off: Rampage is no Mr. T. I'm sorry, but he isn't as big, intimidating, or just plain mean-looking as the Mohawked One was in his prime. In fact, there were points in movie where Quinton came across as almost cuddly. But that said, Rampage Jackson, a UFC fighter by day, surprised the hell out of me by being a more-than-capable actor. On the TV show, B.A. was a mean dude that threw suckas that crossed him- that was pretty much it. But Rampage's B.A. Baracus is far more nuanced and deep, coming to an emotional and moral crisis regarding violence mid-film. This works very well, but it also made him seem wishy-washy. B.A. starts reading books by Gandhi and renouncing his violent ways, but then Hannibal points out that Gandhi said it's ok to fight for what you believe in and suddenly B.A. is fine with killing people again. Um, okay.

This character strayed the furthest from his television roots, although Rampage did an excellent job of directly channeling the spirit of Mr. T whenever "that crazy fool" Murdock would start freaking him out with his insane antics.

However, no one knocks out B.A. with drugged milk, and while he eventually DOES throw a fool, it's not quite as satisfying as when Mr. T did it. Bummer.

Sharlto Copley as Capt. H.M. "Howling Mad" Murdock:
This was the most inspired piece of casting in the movie. Sharlto really blew me away in 2009's District 9 as the nerdy, twitchy Wikus van de Merwe, and the second I heard he was getting this high-profile gig originally made popular by Dwight Schultz in the TV series I actually got very excited. Sharlto proves that his fledgling performance in District 9 was no fluke: he takes Murdock and reinvents the role with a degree of insanity that eclipses Schultz's portrayal, in my opinion. He doesn't just act nuts; he IS nuts, in a way I've never really seen 'nuts' done before. Sharlto constantly changes his accent, his mannerisms, you name it. He's truly unpredictable and I can't wait to see what Sharlto, the most unlikely movie star in ages, brings to his next role.

The rest of the main actors were all actually really good as well. Jessica Biel was fine but probably stood out the least as the scrappy Capt. Sosa. The real stand-outs were Patrick Wilson as CIA agent "Lynch" and Brian Bloom (who I think I remember from an episode of HBO's OZ) as Pike, the villainous leader of a civilian security unit. Both guys were funny, intense, and when it was called for, downright evil. Considering the strength of the main four cast members, it's easy in a film of this type for the supporting cast to be overwhelmed, but that's not the case here, and The A-Team is all the better for it.

Okay, the bad stuff. the editing is a nightmare at times. The A-Team exemplifies rapid-fire cuts and camera shaking to its extreme, and it makes some of the fights impossible to keep track of. It seems to let up as the movie goes on, but it's still a major annoyance. Also, some of the action scenes, as mentioned above, are just so over-the-top that it ceases being in any way, shape, or form believable; there's a scene involving a cargo ship near the end that not only is the pinnacle of implausibility, but also features Lego-quality (read as: BAD) computer effects. The ending reigns it back in, but there's points in The A-Team where I was just shaking my head at how silly it all was.

But in the end, The A-Team is about character and nostalgia, and it has all that covered quite nicely. Overall, this summer isn't really packed with many blockbuster films, and out of those that I've seen (and the vibe I'm getting from those that have yet to come), I'd say The A-Team stands pretty much near the head of the pack. It's fun, first and foremost. Well, actually, that’s all it is, but if you were expecting anything else out of an adaptation of The A-Team, you crazy fool!

Christopher Boyle

June 13, 2010 9:00 AM Eastern

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