'Rollerball' should roll straight to video store

by Jason Zingale
Staff Writer

Some movies never should have been made, and high on that list is the new remake of 1975’s James Caan-vehicle, Rollerball. The film was supposed to have been released last year but was held back for extensive re-editing due to an R-rating caused by too much violence. In fact, the Caan version wasn’t any good, so it makes you wonder why director John McTiernan even thought about making this film.

The new version stars American Pie’s Chris Klein as Jonathan Cross, a pro hockey hopeful who joins this extreme sport to earn quick cash and escape the country after being hounded by cops for illegal streetracing.

He quickly finds himself in Europe, where he becomes the star of Rollerball, a renegade, televised sport that combines all the worst aspects of the WWF and roller derby. It's also extremely dangerous, and is about to get worse. League owner Petrovich (Jean Reno) is hungry for ratings, so when he notices an “accident” in the ring one night involving the major injury of a player, he quickly ups the violence level, resulting in deadly results for the other players.

With help from with his best friend and teammate Ridley (LL Cool J), along with love interest and teammate Aurora (Rebecca Romijn-Stamos), Jonathan tries to quit the team, though Petrovich may not let him.

The film boasts what may be one of the worst lines of dialogue ever to show up in film. Chris Klein says to love interest Rebecca Romijn-Stamos, "Your face isn't as bad as you think."

This fails, obviously, as a pick-up line, but is also an odd thing to say to your girlfriend, especially if she is a supermodel. Romijn-Stamos has a little red scar in Rollerball, but certainly no one is looking at it when she strolls topless from the shower into Klein's arms. Personally, I didn't even notice the scar until Klein opened his big mouth, but I could have been distracted by how shockingly awful and incoherent this movie is.

As humiliating as the film is for all involved, it's worst for John McTiernan, the once-proud director of such blockbusters as Die Hard and The Hunt for Red October. Frankly, this is hackwork that shows little signs of talent. In particular, the action is so chaotic that it's difficult to tell what's going on. The acting is terrible, excluding the great LL Cool J of course, and the cinematography is just a heap of bad camera angles and quick pans, giving the audience an unwanted headache up against the extremely annoying heavy metal soundtrack.