Paranoia
Rating: 2 stars out of 5
Starring: Liam Hemsworth, Harrison Ford, Gary Oldman
Directed by: Robert Luketic
Running time: 106 minutes
Parental guidance: Sexual situations, coarse language
The corporate thriller Paranoia putatively centres on a new top-secret cellphone — something that will not only do phone stuff but also replace your wallet and your keys, which sounds, frankly, like just another way to be a pest in a movie theatre — but the real motivation seems to be finding ways for Liam Hemsworth to appear without his shirt on.
This is no small thing, granted. Hemsworth, the Aussie hunk who got young hearts beating quickly in The Hunger Games, has a very nice chest, and it deserves a showcase. It gets one, too: not since the heyday of early Matthew McConaughey have we seen the like.
But toned as it is, the Hemsworth abs can’t quite disguise the fact the Paranoia is an absurdity whose many distractions — which also include a fetish for glass-and-metal architecture, a high-tech set design apparently meant to hypnotize the youth market, and the casting of two aging stars, Harrison Ford and Gary Oldman, to split the duties of villainy — don’t make up for its essential dopiness. Like the star himself, it’s both good-looking and unfathomable.
Hemsworth plays Adam, a 27-year-old high-tech wannabe who’s caught (he informs us in the film’s frequent voiceover explanations) in a post-recession world. He can’t even afford the medical bills for his aging father (Richard Dreyfuss, whose parentage of Liam Hemsworth puts the science of genetics into serious doubt.) Adam wants the brass ring, and he wants it now.
“We waited long enough. It was our turn to shine,” he tells us, speaking for a generation that occasionally looks up from texting to see how the career’s going.
Adam — a computer genius of the sort who put the “pecs” into specs — works for the powerful billionaire Wyatt (Oldman), a Cockney thug who fires Adam and his whole team of researchers when their pitch for a new product (something about “a cellphone that changes the way we live,” a notion that engenders fantasies of one that never rings) fails to impress him.
However, Adam gets a second chance. Wyatt wants him to insinuate himself into the company of his life-long rival, Goddard (Ford), which is coming out with another revolutionary cellphone, the one that will also be wallet and keys.
Cellphones are at the busy heart of Paranoia: they serve as communication devices, vehicles for spying and McGuffins, but the movie still feels as old-fashioned as that black thing with a dial that Bell used to put into everybody’s house.
Nevertheless, Adam takes the bait, and after training from Wyatt’s staff psychologist (Embeth Davidtz) in how to ingratiate himself to Goddard, he gets a job. He also meets Emma (Amber Heard), a researcher at Goddard’s company with whom he has previously had a one-night stand that is apparently unconnected to the ongoing double- and triple-crosses.
The plot (based on a novel by Joseph Finder) finds room for coincidence, which bespeaks either a very modern flexibility or a fatal lack of imagination, although the filmmakers should get credit for the fact that at least they didn’t meet by cellphone.
Paranoia unfolds in an amoral world where, as Wyatt says, “there is no right or wrong. There’s only winning or losing.” We’re meant to root for it to be brought down, just as we’re supposed to get behind Adam when he has to take on both sides to maintain his integrity, such as it is.
But the stakes seem small. Director Robert Luketic showed a nice hand a light comedy in Legally Blonde, but he has no feel for the tensions of corporate deception, beyond an ability to evoke a world of louche privilege. The twists aren’t surprising, the perils feel artificial, and even Hemsworth’s chest gets a little ho-hum after a while.
The most interesting aspect of Paranoia is the appearance of Oldman and Ford, who is looking especially grizzled but hasn’t lost that twisted smile of menace. They’re fun to watch, even though the movie’s biggest mystery is how they got roped into it. Must have had something to do with answering their cellphones.
Related articles
- Liam Hemsworth Talks PARANOIA, Working with Harrison Ford and Gary Oldman, What He Collects, and More (collider.com)
- Harrison Ford Talks PARANOIA, What He Collects, Film vs. Digital, and ANCHORMAN:THE LEGEND CONTINUES; Says Director Adam McKay is ‘Clearly Insane’ (collider.com)
- Liam Hemsworth’s four years of living famously (with video) (canada.com)
