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Full Review
"Formula 51" is a crass pastiche: part pulp-crime potboiler, part screwball comedy, with dollops of psychedelic drugs and soccer hooligans thrown in for good measure. While the testosterone-driven picture offers a steady diet of car chases, ammo clips and high body counts, helmer Ronny Yu, of Hong Kong action fame, unfortunately chooses to create a morally vacuous world, inhabited by a cast of unsavory misfits just as morally bankrupt.The term Formula 51 refers to a blue, LSD-like concoction more potent than any drug on the market. The brainchild of master chemist Elmo McElroy (Samuel L. Jackson), these hallucinogenic party favors offer the promise of unparalleled ecstasy -- a "personal visit from God" -- the coup de grace being that the formula requires no illegal ingredients.
Yearning to put his pharmacological talents to better use, McElroy rigs a chemical explosion, ridding himself of his boss (Meat Loaf), a psychotic kingpin known as "the Lizard." Armed with only streetwise moxie and a set of golf clubs he wields like a samurai sword, the kilt-clad McElroy jets to Liverpool, England, with plans for a quick, profitable score, selling his secret formula to the highest bidder. Arriving at Liverpool, he is met by his escort, Felix DeSouza (Robert Carlyle), a fast-talking, chain-smoking lackey of the local syndicate czar, dispatched to deliver McElroy safely to the deal.
The unlikely duo soon becomes entangled in a romp through Liverpool's underworld, as everyone -- including rival dealers, corrupt cops and bungling skinheads -- wants a piece of the action. The gold rush sparked by McElroy's magic blue pills triggers a series of double deals and double-crossings, further complicated by the introduction into the mix of Felix's ex-love, Dakota Phillips (Emily Mortimer), an assassin as lethal as she is beautiful, hired by the still-very-alive Lizard to eliminate the competition.
While Yu keeps the film cranked up in high gear, the pyrotechnics and a hip soundtrack do little to mask the underlying moral abyss. Much of the violence is gratuitous, designed to intermittently inject adrenaline into the hackneyed dialogue and predictable plot, rather than move the narrative forward. Though stylishly executed, the action sequences follow the all-too-common tendency of reducing people to props -- fodder to be indiscriminately mowed down, run over or blown up in order to score big at the box office. Moreover, in one scene involving a Keystone-esque band of neo-Nazis, Yu resorts to crude toilet humor in an attempt to elicit cheap laughs, undermining the otherwise appealing chemistry between Jackson and Carlyle.
More disturbing is the thread of "victimization" woven through the film. Yu paints each character as a victim of circumstances, trapped in a quagmire of determinism where free will and responsibility for choices made hold no sway. Throughout the film, McElroy laments his aborted aspirations of becoming a legitimate pharmacist, a dream denied to him by a youthful indiscretion -- driving recklessly while high on marijuana. He angrily blames everyone but himself for the consequences of his actions. Similarly the femme fatale, Dakota, justifies her chosen profession, that of cold-blooded killer, as a means of paying off her gambling debts and escaping the parochial confines of working-class Liverpool. Hardly underdogs worth sympathizing with, much less rooting for.
Due to excessive violence, recurring substance abuse, a sexual encounter and much rough language, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops classification is O -- morally offensive. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is R -- restricted. ( 2002 )
These movies have been evaluated for artistic merit and moral suitability by the media reviewing division of Catholic News Service. The reviews include the CNS rating, the Motion Picture Association of America rating, and a brief synopsis of the movie.
The classifications are as follows:
A-I -- general patronage;
A-II -- adults and adolescents;
A-III -- adults;
L -- limited adult audience, films whose problematic content many adults would find troubling. L replaces the previous classification, A-IV.
O -- morally offensive.
Note: Some movies previously were designated A-IV. Older films with this classification should be regarded as classified L.