Ever since Clint Eastwood lost an argument to an empty chair, his filmmaking has been less symbolic and more slanted. In The 15:17 to Paris, Eastwood took a true-life honest hero moment and turned it into some sort of military recruitment video. This is not the world’s worst idea and neither was the coup of having the real-life heroes play themselves in the movie recreation. However, some history is better left to documentaries. And 15:17 shows that if you’re going to take a chance on recreating history rather than describing it, you probably ought to have real actors or a decent script.
On August 21, 2015, a heavily armed man opened fire on a train going from Amsterdam to Paris. After taking initial control, the terrorist was counter-attacked and subdued by several unarmed passengers. In the aftermath, four humans were made Knights of the Legion of Honour by French president François Hollande. However, one dude wasn’t even American, so screw him. We’re only gonna talk about these three: Spencer Stone, Alek Scarlatos (a dead ringer for perennial NHL All-Star Patrick Marleau), and Anthony Sadler.
Of the incident itself, this is a fabulous recreation, and I’ve no doubt an honest one. The issue here is that the movie run-time on what went down in that summertime train to Paris took about fifteen minutes, start-to-end. So how do you fill the rest of a feature–length movie? Why, with mind-numbing dull portraits interspersed with some grade A USDA bullshit.
Li’l Spencer and Li’l Alek like to play “war.” A lot. Their camo tees clash with the school uniform. They get sent to the principal, often. Their single moms (Judy Greer and Jenna Fischer) often join a discussion. A poignant one happens early on when a teacher points out that ADHD might be a factor here and maybe, mom, you should consider a pharmaceutical solution, pointing out that statistics show drugging kids does help with solving discipline and underachievement issues. Instead of, “No, thank you,” Judy Greer explodes with “MY GOD IS BIGGER THAN YOUR STATISTICS!” Oh, movie, why do you do this to me? Don’t get me wrong, I’m NOT a fan of drugging kids, but did you just say that? On film? Where did you pull it from, a Watchtower pamphlet? The Flat Earth news letter? Gee, why even consider positive results when you can mock science?
I would love to know how PTA meetings go in this school:
“Our kids aren’t learning!”
“They have no respect for anything!”
“School is failing us!”
“What are you going to do?”
.
.
.
“Umm, any chance that a big part of the fault here stems from the ignorant dogma they learn at home?
(Several audible gasps. Pregnant pause.)
.
.
.
“It’s the TEACHER’S UNION!”
“Yeah, what she said!”
“Burn those down. Make our kids smart again, like us.”
*sigh*
At pre-teen, teen, and adult junctures in Spencer’s life, he repeats his philosophy of why he likes to play “war” all the time (and why he has a disturbing arsenal of non-lethal weapons); Spencer “wants to help people.” Now, I don’t doubt the sincerity of Spencer here, nor do I doubt that military action does indeed help people from time-to-time. But help and war don’t generally go hand-in-hand whatever your philosophy. The third time I heard this film mantra, I was reminded of “War is Peace; Freedom is Slavery; Ignorance is Strength.” I’d tell the film to go read 1984, but I’m afraid to get a response of “MY GOD IS BIGGER THAN YOUR PRESCIENT LITERATURE!”
Most of The 15:17 to Paris is either foreshadowing or dull storytelling. It is within rare punctuations that the film comes to life to drown us with
hard-to-swallow philosophy. Most of time, I just wanted to get to the action on the train. That’s why we’re all here.
You take a big chance when you ask non-actors to act. It’s bold, brave even, a daring choice, and kudos for giving true heroes a better day in the sun. But they can’t act. On top of that, this film felt like it had been written on occasion by somebody who trolls gun control websites … poorly. It’s sad, because as much as I wanted to honor the choices these men made, it was very difficult (for me, at least) to separate their noble deeds from the propaganda. Hence, this film would have made a much better documentary.
♪I thank up ev’ry mornin’
Glad that I’m not dead
Nestled in the bunker
Another day of dread
It seems it’s been forever
Since a threat came by
But doncha get too clever
Soon you will see why
My baby takes the Paris train
He dabbles in war now and then
He battles terror, that’s insane
And finds a medal waiting♫
Rated PG-13, 94 Minutes
Director: Clint Eastwood
Writer: Dorothy Blyskal
Genre: Army recruitment video
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: Parents of the three American heroes
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: Ayoub El Khazzani
♪ Parody Inspired by “Morning Train (9 to 5)”
