Sunday, March 17, 2013

A Dark Truth (2013)

Year: 2013
Director: Damian Lee
Cast: Andy Garcia, Forest Whitaker, Eva Longoria
Country of Origin: Canada
Rating: R
Time: 106 min

A Dark Truth is interesting eco-thriller starring worthy actors but long-time director Damian Lee turns this possibly gripping tale of social injustice into another one of his B-rated films. Lee has been a director since the early eighties of obscure Canadian/American films like Ski School, Agent Red, and Sacrifice. Even with his extensive filmography, he managed to turn A Dark Truth to an unoriginal work that plays out like a potential Steven Soderbergh directed thriller that grips your attention right from the beginning but that slowly wanes into a lifeless drama that has little to no conflict. Andy Garcia is Jack Begosian, an ex-CIA operative who becomes a political talk show host after retiring as a spy. He is hired by a corporate whistle-blower to expose her company's cover-up of a massacre in South America. Forest Whitaker is Francisco Francis, a man who discovered that the corporation was responsible for the death of thousands of people and now is on the run from the police. So, fans of social injustice films like Hotel Rwanda and The Last King of Scotland which also stars Whitaker will most definitely be fond of A Dark Truth. 

IMDB claims that the film was released in theaters on January 4th but I don't recall it unless it was only in Canada. But regardless, it seems like it was released straight to dvd last week. The intriguing aspect of straight to dvd is the films supposedly doesn't have the mass appeal to the public to be launched in theaters and is not bad enough to be presented as a television movie. So films like A Dark Truth are in eternal limbo, floating in the realm between Red Box and cable television. But the thing about A Dark Truth is that if Andy Garcia was replaced by Brad Pitt, it would've made it to theaters for sure despite it's lacking storyline. But woulda, shoulda, coulda, we are left with Andy Garcia who stoically takes on the task of the mysterious Begosian. Although we are left with unanswered questions involving Begosian's departure from the CIA, the real charmer of this film is the always delightful Forest Whitaker. He deviates from his usual growling and dominating role to the politically charged and soft-spoken figure that overshadows every other character in his scene (like usual). That's Forest Whitaker for you. And any fan of his would be pleased to see his performance as the Spanish speaking political figure in this film. A unmasked and almost unrecognizable desperate housewife, Eva Longoria, plays Francis' wife and partner in crime on the run. I have said many faults about this film but at the end of the day, I would've bought A Dark Truth on Red Box for Forest Whitaker and its compelling storyline. C+

(p.s. I'm doing a DVD giveaway for A Dark Truth here!)