Proof Of Life

'The huge number of multinational executives being abducted abroad has made organised kidnapping a big business. It has also spawned a counter-industry - getting them back - and a secret drama involving spies and revolutionaries, AK-47's and armoured cars, helicopter drops and hideaways' - William Prouchtnau, Vanity Fair, May 1998.

Already immortalised as the shoot which saw Meg Ryan ditch longtime partner Dennis Quaid for co-star Crowe, Proof Of Life is based on an engrossing investigative piece by journalist William Prouchnau on the blossoming 'K&R' (Kidnapping and Ransom) industry. Unfortunately, Proof of Life manages to take this inherently interesting subject matter, then tacks on an implausible love-story, sacrifices drama in favour of a couple of big action set-pieces, and spins itself out for a whopping 134 minutes. The results are as inviting as they no doubt sound.

David Morse is an engineer for a multi-national oil company working in Colombia, for admirable humanitarian reasons of course (he's building a water-dam). When he's kidnapped by some pesky, evil Marxist revolutionaries for a $3 million ransom, it's left to his new 'hippy wife'(Ryan), as he affectionately calls her, to sort things out. (The nickname is entirely appropriate: her hair doesn't seem to have been washed since 1967).

Her hubby's employer and insurance company are reluctant to accept any responsibility for the matter, so Ryan is forced to enlist ex-SAS man and K&R expert Russell Crowe as her only hope for saving her husband. While Morse is being relentlessly brutalised by nasty stoner paramilitaries, Ryan and Crowe negotiate with his kidnappers - until, with Death-like inevitability, it becomes apparent that the pair are falling for one another.

If you're approaching this out of prurient National Enquirer-style curiosity, you will be severely disappointed, as the Crowe/Ryan sexual chemistry is next to non-existent. And in terms of serious subject-matter insight, the glossy style on offer rules out any genuine value. Nonetheless, there's still something unwittingly compelling about Proof of Life, most notably its worse-than-dodgy political stance. It climaxes with a butch military set-piece straight out of a George W. Bush wet dream, and its analysis of Russia, Chechnya and Colombia runs deep indeed (sample line: 'Trouble flares up so easily in these places!')

Meanwhile, the token good Colombians (i.e. the maids) apologetically snivel lines like 'I'm sorry, I don't understand my country anymore!' to their imperial masters, while said masters attend functions sponsored by 'our invincible armed forces'. So it's standard Hollywood fare, bolstered by the muscular might of Crowe and delivered just about efficiently enough to render it watchable - Proof Of Life is patchy, melodramatic and redeemed only by a xenophobia that borders on the heroic.