Movie Review - Premium Rush

Premium Rush (2012)

Starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Michael Shannon, Dania Ramirez, and Jamie Chung

Directed by David Koepp

Premium Rush is essentially an eighty-minute long chase sequence, and for a movie that's all about a race to the finish to be lacking in any drive or excitement that has to be considered a disappointment.  Joseph Gordon-Levitt is Wilee, a bicycle courier in New York City.  It's a somewhat dangerous profession navigating the busy streets of NYC, but Wilee thrives on the rush it gives him.  One afternoon, Wilee is dispatched to a local university to pick up an envelope from, as it turns out, his girlfriend's roommate Nima (Jamie Chung) and deliver it to a location in Chinatown.  Almost as soon as he gets the envelope, Wilee is confronted by a man who states he's Nima's boss demanding that Wilee return the delivery.  When Wilee refuses, the man (played by Michael Shannon) sets out to track Wilee down and do whatever is necessary in order to obtain the contents of that envelope.

Premium Rush knows it's pure fluff and pure fluff is fine sometimes, but something doesn't quite click here.  Michael Shannon is over-the-top (and not in a good way) as the neurotic man who demands the envelope be handed over to him.  As his character's secrets are revealed and Shannon chews more and more of the scenery around him, my eyes began to roll a bit in frustration.  Gordon-Levitt shows that he can ride a bike...but he isn't given much else to do except pedal and constantly look behind him to see if he's being tailed.

The film has some fun with jumping around in time and it certainly is a gimmick that makes a throwaway film like this a bit more enjoyable.  Unfortunately, as the pieces of the puzzle begin to come together, I didn't care much about the final product.

The RyMickey Rating:  C-