The way the business of films is covered in the media and on the internet these days, it is rare that I get an invitation to screen a flick that I know next to nothing about. It is something I wish would happen more often: not knowing what actor is going to show up next, or how much of the story was completely spoiled by the trailers makes watching a new story so much more enjoyable … as long as the story is worth watching. And so it was with my screening of Baltasar Kormákur’s latest flick, 2 Guns.

The flick stars Denzel Washington (the only thing I knew going in) and Mark Wahlberg as two partners-in-crime … or a pair of undercover agents who each believes they are working with a real criminal. (Don’t get me started on Wahlberg’s character’s backstory; I’m not sure they could have been more technically inconsistent if they tried.) The rest of the cast is surprisingly solid on paper: Edward James Olmos plays a the leader of a drug cartel the duo are trying to take down, Paula Patton is Denzel’s control officer while James Marsden is Wahlberg’s boss and Bill Paxton rounds out the cast as mysterious character whose bad side the duo quickly find themselves on.

When the flick is about Denzel and Wahlberg riding in a car or sitting across from each other at a diner table, busting each other’s chops, it excels. The two have a great chemistry, and play off of each other very well. Wahlberg is particularly funny, playing his character just enough over-the-top without going overboard (think Mel Gibson in the Lethal Weapon flicks minus the crazy). Denzel, however, is playing a character who’s playing an undercover role that’s basically half of his IMDB page … but since he’s so good at playing it, it is easily forgiven.

Unfortunately, there’s more to the movie than the two of them arguing. 2 Guns is based on a comic book I’m not familiar with, so I can’t say how directly lifted from the page the plot is, but it is horrible. It is like the writer indiscriminately decided to reveal certain information about the story at random times, because keeping the audience in the dark makes your movie look smarter. (Hint: Smart films that do this are smart, dumb films that do this are still dumb and now annoying to boot.) The worst part is that the vast majority of reveals are incredibly obvious; in particular the secret connection between two characters is easily sussed out. Also, I couldn’t tell if Paxton’s character’s story was supposed to be a big reveal or not; he says something during his first appearance on screen that made it clear who he was, but when it was revealed later in the flick, everyone in the theatre I was in reacted.

As much as the plot irritated (read: pissed me off), I can’t say I walked out of movie completely having disliked it. As I said, I could have watched a whole movie that was the two leads sitting in a car on a stakeout; the schtick they have playing off of each other is just that fun. Paula Patton also impressed; she played a scene opposite Washington’s character while speaking on the phone that was particularly well performed. I also enjoy an adult comedy, one that’s not afraid to amp up the violence while not making things so serious. It isn’t everyday you can laugh at chickens being shot with handguns, but Wahlberg’s undercover persona’s “panache” somehow makes it work.

I’d hoped that after seeing 2 Guns, I would be feel the need to immediately check out the source material (as much as a film like Wanted is derided, I enjoyed it and the books it was based on). Sadly, the problems I had with the flick’s story — and that the most enjoyable part was the leads’ acting — leads me to believe that as “meh” as I was about the flick, I’d like the books even less.

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I’ve been looking forward to Flight since I first saw the trailer months ago. The plot immediately hooked me: “What if Captain Sully was drunk when he landed that plane?” Because, let’s be real: the inspiration for Flight clearly came from Captain Sully’s infamous and heroic 2009 landing of an American Airlines plane in the Hudson River. From the folksy name, “Whip Whitaker” to the eerily matter-of-fact black box recording, Whitaker is an alternate version of Sullenberger. However, while Sullenberger proved to be squeaky clean and was able to weather the media storm while remaining a hero, Whitaker does not. This is a compelling story and as a whole, Flight works. However, I couldn’t help but imagine how amazing it would be in someone else’s hands.

As Ivey mentioned in his review of Flight, the film turns out to be a study in addiction. Denzel Washington gives one of the best performances of his career, further cementing his status as one of those rare actors about whom that statement can be sincerely made after nearly all of his films. The audience hates Whip, then they love him. Sympathy, revulsion, pity; Washington expertly leads us down all of these paths. He’s also bolstered by an incredible supporting cast that includes such heavy-hitters as Don Cheadle, John Goodman, Melissa Leo, and relative newcomer (at least to American audiences), Kelly Reilly. Killer story, fantastic acting, and tension that was positively palpable at times. Flight has all of the ingredients for an amazing movie, but I spent so much of it rolling my eyes so hard I thought they were going to pop out of my skull.

Zemeckis quickly pushes us right off that cliff with a scene of Nicole doing heroin that is only slightly less ridiculous than Jessie Spano’s bout with pills on Saved By the Bell.The scene not only features photos of her cancer mom, and camera work that goes, “Cancer mom. Needle. Cancer mom. Vein. Cancer mom,” but is actually set to “Under the Bridge,” the Red Hot Chili Peppers song that is literally about doing heroin.

Dear God, WE GET IT.

It was at about this point that I started wondering what Flight would look like if someone like Ryan Fleck, who co-wrote and directed Half Nelson, were in charge.

Half Nelson is spare and quiet; the opposite of the lush, larger-than-life Flight. Where Denzel Washington’s most powerful moments are all but drowned out by music cues (This one means that he is redeeming himself!!!!), Ryan Gosling faced no such fight in Half Nelson. The film is quiet and the camera stays on him in such an intimate way that the audience feels as though they are struggling with him. They can feel the hope; the lies; and ultimately the disappointment. With Flight, I just felt like I had to fight through everything to get to what mattered.

Zemeckis hasn’t done a live-action movie since 2000’s Cast Away. Since then, he’s been focusing on dead-eyed cartoons like Polar Express, so it makes sense that he’s forgotten what to do with living, breathing, flesh-and-bones actors. A heart-warming animated tale about a child rediscovering the joys of Christmas demands a different touch. Unfortunately, the feel is ultimately the same. When you have Denzel Washington, your job should be easy. You set up the camera and you walk away. When you return, there will be magic. Instead, Flight proves that bigger does not always equal better. Maybe one day, someone can come along and remake it with a more gentle touch.

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If you’ve seen the commercials and trailers for Denzel Washington’s new movie Flight, you probably think you’ve got a pretty good idea what it’s about. Denzel plays a badass pilot, who saves the day by flying a passenger aircraft in ways it was never intended to (spoiler: upside down). There is a question about whether or not he’s at fault, and because we learn that he’s a crazy bastard who’d roll a plane with 102 people on board, it’s not that much of a stretch to think he’s a bit out there.

I asked a fellow Clacker to describe what he thought the film was about having only seen the trailer and television spots. Michael’s response: “It’s about the skewering of a pilot who doesn’t deserve to be skewered.”

But you, see, all of that is not what Flight is about. Sure, the things that you see in the trailer happen, but the film’s marketing barely even hints at the real story. How much misdirection? One of the flick’s most central characters is nearly completely absent from any of the marketing.

It’s very clear in the first five minutes that the impression we all got from the marketing might not be entirely accurate. We also see how the film garnered it’s R-rating in that same time period. We find Washington’s Whip Whitaker in a hotel bedroom littered with liquor and beer bottles with a very attractive – and very naked – member of the flight crew finishing off a joint before Whitaker finishes off a line of coke … all two hours before his next flight is scheduled to take off. To my friend Michael’s point: there is never any doubt that Whitaker was in the wrong getting into that cockpit.

Also never in doubt was the idea that his actions when the plane failed were heroic, but again, that’s not what Flight is about. In actuality, the film is about addiction and the series of compounding lies that addicts tell to keep their problem private. In some ways, Flight is commercial for programs like Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous (Note: that’s not a slight on those two groups that do incredible work).

The central character you’ve never heard of is Nicole — played superbly by Kelly Reilly — a fellow addict Whitaker meets in the hospital after the crash. Her introduction feels almost like an interruption originally, because it doesn’t seem like part of the story we were trying to watch. Interspersed with Whitaker’s morning and the events leading up to the crash, we follow Nicole as she seeks out and finds a high that puts her into the hospital for her fated meeting. She’s a character that audiences will instantly root for, hoping that her journey will somehow inspire Whitaker along a similar course. But addicts in denial will always be addicts, and Nicole departs our story almost as suddenly as she is thrust into it. Despite seeming so important throughout the film, she plays little to no role in the resolution.

The one thing Nicole refused to be was his enabler; but Whitaker was surrounded by enough of those. From his lawyer (Don Cheadle) to his union rep / “old friend” (Bruce Greenwood) to his dealer (the always hilarious John Goodman), none of the people close to him hold him accountable. There’s a family he doesn’t really have anymore, but they play such a little role in the story – until it’s time to make a cruel unnecessary point – that they’re not really relevant.

Denzel Washington’s performance is solid, and I’m sure people who are personally closer to the challenges of addiction will have enjoyed the movie a great deal more than I have. I was looking for something else; not necessarily a different story, but a more complete one. When Whitaker is at the film’s climax, left to tell the final lie that will protect his name, the biggest influence on the outcome has little-to-nothing to do with the previous hour and a half of the flick. I wanted to like Flight, but 1.5 great performances isn’t enough to keep me interested in a slow, plodding story that doesn’t differentiate itself from every other movie about addiction that we’ve seen before.

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