‘Daylight’ Will Have You Wishing For Nightfall

Fri., Dec. 6, 1996

Michael H. Price Fort Worth Star

And here, I’d thought I was gonna be able to skip town before “Daylight.” No such luck, however, and I wind up sitting through this suffocating “disaster” movie feeling every bit as trapped as its characters.

Turns out that “Daylight” is the very movie that Sylvester Stallone’sdetractors had hoped “Cliffhanger” (1993) would be - plodding, incoherent, and driven by neither action nor character. But “Cliffhanger’s” breathtaking high-altitude maneuvers and utter sincerity proved an antidote for the incoherence bug that afflicts that entire genre. “Daylight” has no such salvation.

What the new arrival does have is a high concept - underwater commuter tunnel, linking Manhattan to New Jersey, gets sealed off and ready to collapse - and a low execution.

Faded stereotypes, left over like thrift-store castoffs from the disaster-movie craze of a generation ago, populate this muddle. Stallone plays a professional rescue worker, reduced to delivery-boy service in the wake of some on-the-job disgrace. There’s a self-sacrificing policeman (Stan Shaw), along with a sensitive, artistic soul (Amy Brenneman), an arrogant Mr. Businessman-type (Viggo Mortensen) and a likable elderly couple (Claire Bloom and Colin Fox) - to say nothing of the joy-riding punks whose lack of traffic courtesy is the cause of the whole mess.

Director Rob Cohen allows the smoke screen of special effects to carry as much of the picture as he can get away with. Explosions and electrical fritzes abound, along with high-speed collisions and collapsing structures. The human stunt-action is convincing enough, but the related special effects look mostly like throwbacks to more primitive times for the FX industry.

Leslie Boehm’s screenplay is generic hash, with bickering and whining in lieu of any propulsive or meaningful dialogue, and no sense that the crisis at hand might mean redemption (or at least a boost in self-esteem) for Stallone’s character. There is no sense of heroism, just of a veteran Hollywood muscleman going through the motions of being a movie star.

xxxx Locations: Lincoln Heights, Newport and Coeur d’Alene cinemas Credits: Directed by Rob Cohen, starring Sylvester Stallone, Amy Brenneman, Stan Shaw Running time: 1:49 Rating: PG-13

The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Michael H. Price Fort Worth Star-Telegram

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