"Collateral Damage"

"Collateral Damage" quickly plunges into boggy terrain from which it can never extricate itself. A CIA agent with a sort of mangy, flea-bitten appearance (Elias Koteas) tells Gordon that, in the interests of peace negotiations in Colombia, the U.S. government won't go after the guerrilla named El Lobo, who apparently carried out the bombing. In the twinkling of an eye, of course, Gordon finds himself in a Colombian prison with no passport or visa or weapons, right next to a Canadian sex fiend (John Turturro) who is in the movie for no reason at all. Not only is Turturro about the last person I would pick to play a Canadian -- and, yes, I recognize that Canadians come in a glorious panoply of colors and ethnic heritages -- but he has to utter the line: "Put a sock in it! I'm just a wrench for hire!"

At least John Leguizamo seems to have a good time with his stereotypical role as a backwoods cocaine lord who briefly takes Gordon under his wing, quipping his way through a few scenes that feel like improvised departures from the ponderous script by brothers David and Peter Griffiths. "Hey, your English is pretty good for a German guy," he tells Gordon (who is passing himself off as a German mechanic). When Gordon realizes the nature of his business, Leguizamo is halfway apologetic: "Yeah, I know, I know, I know. Just 'cause I'm brown and down don't mean I want to work for minimum wage."

Leguizamo's role isn't half as offensive as that of Cliff Curtis, who plays the guerrilla leader Claudio, or "El Lobo," as a Che Guevara wannabe laden with histrionic gestures and pseudo-revolutionary pronouncements. "Americans are obsessed with false family values," he announces in his Frito Bandito accent. "They have forgotten the reality of war." I'm all in favor of colorblind casting, I guess, but Curtis is a New Zealander who seems only to portray swarthy ethnic villains; he has played Arabs in "The Majestic," "The Insider" and "Three Kings."

A well-timed guerrilla attack allows Gordon to escape both the Colombian government and Koteas' renegade CIA operation. He winds up imprisoned again in Claudio's camp, where Claudio's wife Selena (the Italian actress Francesca Neri), who apparently regrets the movement's turn to violence, pleads for his life. Don't worry, I haven't given away much of anything; all this happens before the major characters pick up stakes again and move to Washington, where Claudio plans to launch a major bombing campaign against the U.S. government.

Fundamentally, "Collateral Damage" has a divided spirit that doesn't serve it well: Davis is an action filmmaker with a brooding, somewhat cynical worldview, while Schwarzenegger can and should only play Herculean superheroes who vanquish evil with one arm and shelter women and children with the other. In ordinary circumstances, this would come off as a jumbled, middling adventure movie, neither the best nor the worst entry in either Davis' or Schwarzenegger's career, a diverting placeholder for fans who await "Terminator 3." But these aren't ordinary circumstances: Wounds are still raw, families are still grieving and Americans still hunger for retribution. Protests and box-office bonanza aside, "Collateral Damage" still doesn't mean a thing.

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