Posted by Mr. Beaks

When John Singleton makes a watchable movie, it’s an accident.  With the exception of South Central, none of the early 90’s gang banger flicks have worn worse over the years than Boyz ‘N the Hood – it’s as relevant as a Stanley Kramer film, but amateurishly directed.  Take away his “breakthrough” film, and Singleton’s career becomes a pothole riddled expressway to studio hackdom, where it appears he’ll be able to hide behind the professionalism of others and take credit for competently made motion pictures.  He captivated white critics who don’t listen to soul music with a single “Trouble Man” cue in Four Brothers, and, $75 million later, is now set up to remake Sam Peckinpah’s worst film, Convoy.  That Bloody Sam could direct a more interesting movie blind drunk is beside the point; Singleton will do Paramount’s bidding and turn in the homogenized product Peckinpah had too much talent and/or pride to deliver.  All told, it’ll probably be Black Dog but stupider. 

Actually, it sounds like it’s going to be Wages of Fear in Afghanistan, which couldn’t be further removed from Singleton’s ferociously limited skill set (i.e. dressing himself and not touching hot surfaces).  The script by Matthew Hollaway and Arthur Marcum is set in the forgotten war zone where American truckers have signed on to haul material for U.S. contractors at a lucrative rate not available back home.  In other words, it’s a conflated conflagration of Bush’s bad economic policy and incompetent military planning.  Singleton done got political!