So, first of all, if you have nostalgic good memories of John Q, please feel free to hold them -- just don't ever return to the movie.
I did, and holy crap is it awful -- incessant, silly and obtrusive score, almost no plot points that make sense, terrible jokes even for 2002, and no ability to find a moral center.
Some lowlights:
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The premise is obviously absurd, but the movie does nothing to make it believable.
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Duvall is the hostage negotiator, but also the cop who escorts Denzel from the courtroom at the end?
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James Woods is the evil doctor, who is also brilliant, and also bad, but then kind of good, but then still has floozies on both arms at the end, because obviously he'd bring multiple girlfriends to a courtroom.
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Anne Heche and Ray Liotta are the bad guys, and are portrayed as pure objective evil. Heche cries at the end because I guess it's the first time she's considered that feelings exist? There's more exploration of the motives and mindset of villains in the depiction of the criminal gray tabby Fat Cat from Chip N' Dale Rescue Rangers.
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There's a triple-fake-out suicide at the end. His wife reaches him on the radio but of course wants to give a monologue before saying "oh and yeah we found a heart, don't shoot yourself."
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The emotional punch of the movie is supposed to come from the line "it's not goodbye... it's see you later" being said multiple times. I guess they thought this was an original concept?
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There's like six endings: the trial, the goodbye/see you later line, Eddie Griffin saying "you're my hero" while dressed like he's about to head to NYC for his performance as a rapper accused of murder in a Law & Order episode, and then Denzel's son whispering "thank you" from 40 feet away in a crowd while his dad drives off to prison. Maybe in the intervening 3 months he could have said that? Oh and then he flexes because flexing is also an emotional button this movie pushes a dozen times.
So, yes, it's bad. But Denzel is oh so good.
Does he phone it in in some movies? Yes. That awful one with Ryan Reynolds is one of the few I've walked out on because I couldn't stay awake.
But this is prime Denzel, rising above the material and crushing it in several ways.
It's easy to point to his goodbye speech to his son, and you should: it's exquisite, flawless acting in a long take. No one cries quite like Denzel. But there's so much more that's good: Denzel doing the bills before his son gets sick and arguing with his wife, his interactions with his coworkers, his kindness to the patients in the hospital.
But the best part is the whole hostage scenario, highlighted by when it starts. Denzel manages to radiate how unsure he feels, how much he's making decisions as he goes, how much he realizes what trouble he's in and how little sense his plan makes. He's become a shark surviving by movement, unwilling and unable to face reality.
It's peak Denzel star power, but also near-peak Denzel performance. I'd slide it right in the top tier with Malcolm, Flight, Glory, Fences, Training Day. It's easy to think of Denzel through the lens of his charisma and dynamism, but it becomes easy to forget how great of an actor he really is. This movie highlights that in ways almost no other movie does.
It just so happens that this movie is really really bad.
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source https://www.reddit.com/r/movies/comments/n0y0ef/denzel_in_john_q_might_be_the_best_performance/
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