The Next Three Days

What do you do when the love of your life is, without warning, locked up in prison? With your spouse behind bars, sealed off from the outside world, having to take not-very-private showers, what would you do to resolve this situation? Well, according to John Brennan (Russell Crowe, "Gladiator"), you've gotta bust them out of there by any means necessary.

John, a teacher at a community college, lives with his wife, Lara (Elizabeth Banks, "Zack and Miri Make a Porno"), and their young son, Luke (Ty Simpkins, "Little Children“). Family life is what appears to be fine and comfortable with these three, there still being sexual flavour burning in the wedded couple's relationship, and a strong bond between parent and child.

That is, until one morning when Lara is arrested on suspicion of murdering her boss with a fire extinguisher in a parking garage. With blood drops found on her coat, and her fingerprints imprinted on the murder weapon, all the evidence points to Lara having committed the violent crime. John, however, is determined that his wife is completely innocent, and backs appeals for her to be released. They all fail, and Lara is sentenced to twenty years imprisonment.

Riddled with desperation, John struggles to deal with the incarceration of his beloved other half. A suicide attempt from her while she's stuck in the slammer combusts something in his mind -- he has to get her out of there, no matter the consequences.

Seeking guidance from jail-breaking ex-con Damon Pennington (Liam Neeson, "Taken"), John begins to scheme sneaky ways of setting his wife free. Less than an amateur at this sort of thing, John stumbles into some unfortunate mishaps, but takes Damon's advice and laboriously plans out how he can perform the prison break and hold his girl in his arms again. Dat scho schweet.

To say the least, "The Next Three Days" is a far-fetched film. The elaborate tactics of the literature educator border upon illogical and his constant getting-away-with-criminal-acts puts the law enforcement agency to ridiculing shame. John Brennan is one lucky son of a bitch, one might say.

He starts off as an average 40-something father and husband, his love spreading to both his wife and son. His companion's criminal conviction activates something within him -- an obsessive determination that now consumes his everyday life. He "knows" that Lara is innocent, but he has never thought to ask her -- even if he knew she was guilty, he would still want to spring her from jail.

Throughout the course of the film, John is driven to dire extremities (which sadly doesn't include flinging a phone at a hotel employee), carrying out things his pre-murder-charged-wife self would not have ever dreamt of doing. It's odd watching him go from bookish school teacher to Maximus Decimus Meridius in the space of about an hour.

What makes his illicit actions interesting is that he does them not necessarily out of a desire to correct miscarried justice, but out of a need to be with his wife. He wants her to gain freedom once again, and nothing will stand in his way as he tries to achieve this criminally ambitious goal. His passion is what nourishes the film.

The innocence of the likable and sympathetic Lara is mostly clouded in mystery. There are flashbacks to that fateful night, coming from John's piecing together of evidence, but her status of guilt remains unclear until the ending. Because of this, my personal longing for John to accomplish his wishes of setting her loose were occasionally bankrupted as my liking of Lara would momentarily become smudged. At several points I actually wanted John to fail his mission -- a feeling not helped by some of his selfish activity.

Crowe and Banks are both brilliant and enthralling leads, equally bringing some emotional depth to their distressed characters. There is a strong sense of yearning shared between them as they look at each other while talking through a prison phone, and while guards watch them when the two aren't separated by glass. Their relationship is, for the most part, a moving one.

Oscar-winning writer and director Paul Haggis ("Crash", "In the Valley of Elah") keeps the suspense high and the adrenaline on the tip of ignition. A scene in which John attempts to use a "bump key" to enter a secured elevator while surrounded by unknowing cops is especially tense, worsened when the procedure goes horribly wrong. The last 30-or-so minutes of the film also carry an effective "will they, won't they?" quality as the prison stunt becomes a fast-moving reality.

"The Next Three Days" begins as an emotional drama and eventually turns into an edge-of-your-seat crime thriller. Its pace seems to get confused as to whether it should either be too rushed or too slow, and the plot requires an extreme suspension of disbelief, but Paul Haggis' prison-break piece is still a decent effort that boasts sensational performances from Crowe and Banks. Liam "Qui-Gon Jinn" Neeson is only in one scene, though. Boo!

6/10