Movie Reviews

I kept thinking of two things while watching John Q: 1) it sure is nice to live in Canada, where everyone basically has free health-care, and 2) damn, this movie sucks.

The story is basically about a father (Denzel Washington) who decides to hold an emergency room hostage because the hospital refuses to give his son a desperately-needed heart transplant (because his insurance won't cover the $250,000 operation). Now, I guess a situation like that could make for a pretty interesting segment in an episode of E.R. or something, but it gets really tired after about the first hour of this two-hour movie.

It's hard to get interested in a movie where so much of what happens is completely preposterous. I mean, okay, so Denzel pulls out a gun and takes the emergency room hostage. You'd think most of the hostages would freak out or something, or at least seem worried. But no, they're suprisingly accepting of the situation, and actually seem to like the guy right off the bat. Then as his story spreads over the news, thousands of people stand lined up around the hospital, waving and cheering him on like he's some kind of hero. Sure, yeah, he's doing it for a noble reason (save his son's life, blah blah blah), but he's got hostages, and he's threatening to kill them! Sheesh.

I also found it amusing that the lead detective/interrogator guy was named Frank Grimes.