Taylor Lautner: Yay or Nay

Crossposted on and commissioned by Film.com

With Abduction coming out today, Taylor Lautner's first starring vehicle, we thought we should take this opportunity to evaluate the young actor's chances of making the jump from supporting cast member to leading man. Does he have what it takes or should he just stick to the sidelines? It's investigation time - Pros and Cons style.

The Cons

Lack of Acting Talent
The overarching problem with Lautner is the fact that he can't act. He tries to act. And occasionally is okay. But mostly, he is untrained, and not in that raw, interesting kind of way, but in the "doesn't know what he is doing at all even remotely" kind of way. The biggest offense and proof that he has no idea what is going on is that he is, and excuse the actorly term, CONSTANTLY off voice. The easiest way to spot a wannabe actor is when you notice what I call "gravely voice". It means the so called performer doesn't know how to warm up or use his voice, so he defaults to a gravely tone that is a combination of nerves and an attempt at naturalism. Taylor Lautner is so guilty of this, he was giving ME a sore throat during Abduction. Other "gravely voices" can be found hanging out on the CW. Lautner rarely feels honest, and always feels angsty-squinty. His default facial expression is smolder. And he has no idea how to listen, take his time with a moment, or allow something to truly happen on the inside, informing the choices he makes. He does what the script says and not very believably. Granted, the supposed acting lessons he took between Twilight films did make somewhat of a difference, but certainly not enough.

More after the jump




His Face
I don't like it. He doesn't have movie star looks, no matter how much you try to tell me he does. I'm all for unique looking people, but untalented weird looking muscle machines who think they are hot and think I should think so too? This industry isn't exactly screaming for any more of those, you know? Hollywood is trying to make him a star because of his connection to Twilight and his body. Those aren't good enough reasons. There are plenty of actors who this industry tries to make into a star simply because he is pretty and sometimes that girlie gene in me takes over and I'll even see a movie *just* for a boy. (Case in point: What's Your Number for Chris Evans. I'm not ashamed. He is TALENTED TOO.) But Lautner is not that boy. His face makes my face hurt. A lot like his voice makes my throat hurt! Taylor Lautner is bad for me.

Bad Taste = Poor Decision Making
The only movies he has done in his adult life are the Twilight films, Valentine's Day and Abduction. That's zero for five right there. It shows he has no barometer regarding what's actually good, as opposed to awful. Even "fine" or "not bad" would be an upgrade from awful. But no. A movie star needs to know how to pick his projects and Lautner has no discernible idea how to do that.

The Pros

The Brand

Yes, he does have a brand. He is Jacob Black. He has crazy abs. Girls and women and boys and men all over the world love him for this, no matter what. We'll see how Abduction does this weekend, but the thinking now is that his brand alone can open a movie. If Abduction is huge, despite the fact that it is one of the most incompetently made films I've ever seen, it will be because the Taylor faithful turned out en masse.

Boy Next Door Off Screen Persona

Whereas Robert Pattinson has always been displayed as the kind of odd, mysterious one, Lautner, throughout the Twilight process, has taken on more of the sweet, boy next door kind of attitude. I happen to think there's a massive ego underneath the palatable facade, but a lot of his adoring public does not, and being perceived as nice and genuine can go a long way. An even longer way if you can back it up in reality. But can he?

Martial Arts Ability

The best part about Abduction, well the best part about Abduction was Jason Isaacs, but the other not horrible part was anytime Lautner showed off his parkour and martial arts ability. He's actually pretty remarkable. And this is something he came to the table with, as the black belt has been studying karate since he was six years old, and has won three Junior World Championships. It's not something many other actors his age can boast and is incredibly impressive. Anytime he was jumping, punching or spinning, I actually sat up for a second, I took notice. This is where he needs to focus his attention, not on trying to be a leading man.

So what is the conclusion? I find it hard to believe that this kid is going to have a lasting career. Robert Pattinson did nothing for either Remember Me or Water for Elephants, box office wise or quality wise, and Lautner is even weaker than Pattinson is as an actor. Abduction might do okay, but will quickly vanish when anyone other than a 14 year old girl hears how insipid it is. For the most success, I do think Lautner should stray towards the action and more opportunities to do his own stunts and explore his physicality further, but I don't see how he could ever be a Matt Damon, Harrison Ford or even Jason Statham with such a limited acting ability. If he wants to be the star Abduction is trying to make us think he is, he has gotta take some time to really learn how to do this thing and learn the difference between a good script and a bad, really bad, like really REALLY bad one. So, sorry Taylor, for the time being, my answer is Nay. You have some potential hanging out in the depths of your being, but you have wise up, get over yourself, and be open to learning A LOT to do so.

Read More

Abduction. Where to Even Begin.

If you know me, which some of you do, you know it is extremely rare that I dislike a movie. I can recognize its flaws and still enjoy it, still defend it, as I have done with many films and will continue to do, I'm sure, for a long time to come. But this week I saw a movie that is simply so incompetent, amateurish, laughable and a slew of other disparaging words, that nothing can redeem it. That film is called Abduction.

I originally sought out seeing this film to write something on Taylor Lautner's rise as an action star and whether or not he succeeded in his first big outing. I was never planning on seeing the film otherwise, based on the trailer it seemed to me like a potentially awesome film that would be ruined by Lautner's lack of an acting ability. But what I ended up seeing was so beyond atrocious, I couldn't just sit idly by and ignore it.

Where do I even begin. From the opening line of "Yeah baby" to my pages and pages of notes reading phrases like "How would he know that?" and "That makes no sense." and "Why would you do that??!!?!", this film is, frankly, a colossal failure. Five minutes into it, you know you're in for 106 minutes of lame dialogue and underdeveloped characters. 10 minutes into the film and Lautner has already spent a good amount of time with his shirt off. 15 minutes into the film, the best scene has already happened in which Jason Isaacs' Kevin trains Lautner's Nathan by essentially beating the crap out of him. It was a glimmer of hope that was quickly dashed away.

It's difficult to get into just how awful this movie is without revealing some key plot points, but trust me when I say that logic did not play a role in the script, filmmaking, or acting. There is no connective tissue between anything that happens. It feels like it was written by a thirteen year old who LOVES action movies but has no clue how to write one. So he tries and shows it to his mom and his mom says "Aw, this is great honey!" and so that thirteen year old calls Taylor Lautner's dad (Dan Lautner, a producer on Abduction) and is like "my mom said this script is great so you should make it." and so he did. No, this isn't the story of how the film got made, but it might as well be.

First, the plot. The story here, sure, makes enough sense as like, a log line. As one sentence. A sentence I can't say because it's all spoilers. But when it got fleshed out, everything went wrong. None of the reveals pack a punch or make much sense, and the biggest reveal of all is completely underwhelming and makes you feel like you've been along for this "ride" if one could even call it that, for no actual reason. It feels unresolved, emotionless and so absurd, I have to wonder if it was intentional as a secret way to undermine the action film as an institution and subvert Lautner's potential as an action star, because I see no other explanation for how something so comically illogical got greenlit.

The dialogue and exchanges between characters are even worse. So often it seemed like a character was saying something completely unprompted by what the other character just said to him. Like everyone was in his or her own movie making up their own "action movie" lines.

One of my favorite moments was when some very "important" exposition is thrown Nathan's way. And the next scene is Nathan explaining EXACTLY what we just heard, almost verbatim, to Lily Collins' Karen. Why. Why would you do that. Why would you have two scenes with the exact same exposition one right after the other. THIS IS CALLED POOR SCREENWRITING. There is also a moment where we see Nathan and Karen run into the woods. Then follows what we will call Scene W. After Scene W, a bunch of characters are talking about how Nathan and Karen are in the woods. So please tell me why Scene W is necessary. Scene W features Nathan and Karen in the woods. Karen says "hang on I have to catch my breath." So they stop running for about thirty seconds. She does not catch her breath. And then they keep running. That was a scene. A whole scene. It was foreshadowing nothing, it was following up on nothing, it was just pointless. And I laughed out loud.

Moments like these happen pretty consistently for the entirety of the film. It was a never-ending barrage of things that didn't make sense, whether small and subtly incompetent or glaringly over the top examples of idiocy, it was incessant.

And poor Lily Collins. She was just so damn boring. She and Lautner had no chemistry (although their wannabe porn stars make out scene tries *really* hard to make you think they do) and nothing about her jumped out at me at all. I know people like her, so I have to assume it's the movie's fault, not her own. I don't believe Tarsem Singh would cast his Snow White with an actress who was this bland.

So what does work? Jason Isaacs is the best part of the movie. Easily. Unfortunately, the potential with his character is wasted. When the film ended, my movie going buddy and I discussed what changes could have made the film actually work, and we both thought it would involve Isaacs in a larger role. I kinda wish they made the movie we discussed instead of the one they did. It might have actually been interesting or had some modicum of dynamic.

Also, and how is this for bizarre. I saw this movie intending for Lautner to be the worst part of an otherwise awesome action movie. But no. The movie around him was terrible, and although he was pretty terrible for the most part as well, I gotta say that when he is fighting, I dig it. The kid has some serious martial arts skills and the only times I enjoyed myself watching this film were during his all too few (Seriously) action scenes. I would have been thrilled to see a third less nonsense attempting to be a movie and a third more pure action, stretching his boundaries as a fighter and pushing him more in that direction. Lautner is not a leading man. But he is a damn good martial artist.

It physically hurts me to talk about this movie so I'm going to stop now. If you want to, you know, drink and go see a stupid movie and yell at the screen everytime something doesn't make sense, this may be your preferred weekend viewing. If you like things that are good and value your time, STAY AWAY. Looking forward to chatting personally with any of you that have seen this movie so we can go over every single moment that laughed in the face of logic and then kicked logic in the balls.

Read More