There are great action movies (Die Hard, Hard-Boiled), and then there are highly entertaining action movies (Unleashed, anything directed by Rob Cohen) that keep adrenaline junkies entertained in the downtime before the next true classic arrives. A compact, streamlined espionage thriller from screenwriter Kurt Wimmer and director Phillip Noyce, Salt would never be mistaken for the former, though it snaps into the latter category with the snug click of a perfectly placed Lego. No one who sits through Salt is likely to die of boredom, though they might exit the theater a little sore due to laughing at one of the most ridiculously unconvincing movie disguises in recent memory. But plausibility isn't generally high on the list of crucial ingredients for cooking up an entertaining action flick, and thanks to a quickly paced script and some cleverly executed twists, Salt satisfies the craving for greasy fast-food cinema. Two years after being captured in North Korea and tortured as a suspected spy, top CIA agent Evelyn Salt (Angelina Jolie) is about to celebrate her second wedding anniversary to arachnologist Mike (August Diehl) when she is accused by a terminally ill Russian defective of being a sleeper agent for the Russian government. Desperate to clear her name and protect her husband, Salt takes flight, raising the suspicions of up-and-coming CIA agent Peabody (Chiwetel Ejiofor) even as her mentor, Winter (Liev Schreiber), insists that the accusation is unfounded. Now, in order for Salt to clear her name, she must outrun and outwit both the Secret Service and the CIA, all while uncovering information on a diabolical plot to breathe a big chill back into the Cold War with a high-profile assassination. The longer Salt eludes capture, the higher the stakes get. Shortly after co-writing the screenplay for The Thomas Crown Affair (alongside Leslie Dixon), Kurt Wimmer established himself as a rising force in the realm of over-the-top action cinema by jumping into the director's chair for Equilibrium and Ultraviolet, two sci-fi flicks that took ridiculous to delirious new heights. In 2003, Wimmer edged into espionage territory as screenwriter of the lukewarmly received CIA thriller The Recruit, and now he's teamed with director Noyce to deliver a high-stakes spy thriller that's short on originality, yet bristling with intensity. This time Wimmer seems to have modeled his script on a roller coaster, allowing the butterflies to flutter in our stomachs as we slowly creep up that first giant hill, then maintaining an impressive momentum until the ride stops and we exit our seats. And while there's nothing particularly inventive about a story driven by lingering Cold War tensions, sleeper agents, and assassination plots, Wimmer does manage to sneak in some savory particulars while delving into the details of a top-secret Russian program to topple the United States as a superpower, and to throw a few expertly placed third-act sucker punches. If only Noyce's talents as an action director were better matched to Wimmer's particular abilities as a storyteller, perhaps Salt would have been a bit more than a passable diversion. A talented filmmaker with an eye for detail, Noyce handles the dialogue and setup quite well -- eliciting a palpable sense of vertigo during a tense ledge escape early on, and employing sharp diversionary tactics during a suspenseful funeral scene that kicks the plot into high gear -- but the deeper he wades into the action, the more apparent it becomes that shoot-outs and car chases aren't exactly his forte. Like most action directors these days, Noyce refuses to give viewers a real sense of space by sticking primarily to close-up shots when things start to get hairy, a factor that prevents us from truly connecting with the kinetic events unfolding onscreen. But Noyce is quite good with actors, eliciting performances from Jolie, Schreiber, Ejiofor, and Daniel Olbrychski that go a long way in counter-balancing the hastily helmed action sequences. Odds are, Salt won't be the launching point for a hugely successful blockbuster action series à la The Bourne Identity -- as the filmmakers so clearly intended with the shamelessly open ending -- but until the next time we truly taste greatness, it's digestible enough to trick our stomachs into thinking we've feasted on filet mignon and fine wine, when in reality we've just wolfed down some chicken-fried steak and a chocolate shake.
07/29/2019
Arnold’s debut is a lyrical but long-winded portrayal of a woman reckoning with the disappointments of her life. Ash passes her days swimming at a deserted lake with her seven-year-old daughter, Charlie. When she senses Charlie grow distant as she gets older, Ash commits an unforgivable act while trying to reconnect. This sets in motion the crumbling of Ash’s emotional world, revealing memories of an affair with her yoga instructor, a capricious bisexual woman, and a complicated relationship with her father. Ash slips into a depression that confines her to bed, forcing her husband into the arms of a family friend who comes by to care for Charlie. The narrator’s idiosyncratic, troubled personality is expressed through her obsessive interest in sounds and words. During her first date with her husband, she tells him that she collects words, stating that “finding the right word is like finding a pebble on a whole beach of pebbles.” Arnold uses language like a set of dominoes, connecting endings of sentences to beginnings with sounds and phrases to create an artful tumble of prose. However, the novel’s high style comes at the price of momentum, and it becomes opaque to the point of being inaccessible. With very little plot, Arnold’s novel asks questions of profound moral consequence that get lost in the fogginess of its narrator. (July)
Any serious student of Reformed theology needs to sit at the feet of Petrus van Mastricht. The challenge has been that to do so you needed to know Latin or Dutch. Thanks to the herculean efforts of the folks at the Dutch Reformed Translation Society and Reformation Heritage Books, English readers can now learn the art of ‘living for God through Christ.’” Stephen J. Nichols, president of Reformation Bible College and chief academic officer of Ligonier Ministries
“With each translation of the formative Reformed theologians of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries comes the possibility of our churches being renewed by forgotten treasures. This is one of those gold mines. So important is van Mastricht that even Descartes felt obliged to respond to his critiques and Jonathan Edwards drew deeply from the well of his Theoretical-Practical Theology. It is a distinct pleasure to recommend this remarkable gem.” Michael Horton, J. Gresham Machen Professor of Systematic Theology and Apologetics, Westminster Seminary California
“The very title of this work, Theoretical-Practical Theology, indicates why, three centuries ago, Petrus van Mastricht’s work appealed to Scottish ministers who studied under him or read his theology. Not least of these was his student James Hog, who would later famously republish The Marrow of Modern Divinity. In making van Mastricht’s classic available in English for a new generation of students, pastors, and scholars, the Dutch Reformed Translation Society and Reformation Heritage Books are giving a great gift to the Christian church as a whole, and to students, pastors, and scholars in particular.” Sinclair B. Ferguson, Chancellor’s Professor of Systematic Theology, Reformed Theological Seminary; and teaching fellow, Ligonier Ministries