Greg Bales

Ronin

I am watching Ronin on television. Not closely enough to follow the plot, however, but it’s just as well. So far as I can tell, there isn’t one. Every few minutes Robert de Niro squints with suspicion then sets out on a high-speed car chase over scenic highways or city streets. Seventy-five percent of the soundtrack is the sound of a BMW revved to 3500 RPM.

Over Alpine highways, in tunnels at rush-hour, across bridges, and through narrow medieval streets the chases run, and in every other scene a pedestrian dodges just in time to save his life. It strikes me as strange that none are mangled or maimed. Just now, a BMW crashed into a café in Lyon where I presume diners, many probably tourists, were enjoying coffee and croissants. Not one of the diners was trapped beneath a wheel, her leg crushed; not one cried from the pain of a broken arm while de Niro investigated.

The only immortal Hollywood ever really made was a bystander in an action movie.