Film Review: Setup (dir by Mike Gunther)

Posted on March 25, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

On the mean streets of Detroit …. really, Detroit again?

Well, anyway, Sonny (5o Cent) is a career criminal who also happens to be a really nice guy. When his partner-in-crime, Vincent (Ryan Phillippe), worries about the survival of his imprisoned father (James Remar), Sonny is sympathetic. When his other partner-in-crime, Dave (Brent Granstaff), won’t shut up about how much he loves his wife and his life in the suburbs, Sonny is genuinely happy for him. Sonny may be a criminal but he’s not violent. He’s not a killer.

Understandably, Sonny is upset when Vincent kills a guard during their latest diamond heist. However, that’s nothing compared to how angry Sonny becomes when Vincent betrays both him and Dave, shooting them and leaving them for dead. Dave dies but Sonny survives. Seeking revenge, Sonny teams up with a gangster named Biggs (Bruce Willis). Biggs demands that Sonny retrieve some money for him. It really shouldn’t be that difficult except for the fact that every criminal in Detroit is soon revealed to be an absolute idiot.

At this point, I’ll admit that 2011’s Setup has more than a little in common with Gun. Like that film, it takes place in Detroit and it centers on the drama that takes place in the shadows of the underworld. 50 Cent plays a criminal in both films. James Remar has a small role in both films. Both films feature multiple betrayals and both of them contrast the criminals on the street with the bosses behind-the-scenes. Both films were also produced by Randall Emmett. Indeed, this was one of the first films that Bruce Willis did with Emmett. Emmett would go on to produce several of Willis’s final films and there’s definitely some controversy as to whether or not those films exploited Willis at a time when he was particularly vulnerable.

That said, I actually kind of liked Setup. It’s definitely a low-budget B-flick but it still has its ambitions and it actually achieves some of them. 50 Cent is far more convincing as the well-intentioned but somewhat dumb Sonny in Setup than he was in Gun and he actually does pretty well as the film progresses and Sonny becomes more conflicted about whether or not he actually wants his legacy to be one of vengeance. Ryan Phillippe is well-cast as Vincent and I liked the performances of Jay Karnes and Jenna Dewan, both playing low-level criminals who find themselves in over their heads. The film did a good job of examining all of the different levels of crime in Detroit, from the wealthy Biggs all the way down to the idiots who continually screw up the simplest of plans. Randy Courtere does an especially good job as Petey, the moron who thinks playing with a loaded gun is a good idea.

As for Bruce Willis, his role here is small and it’s a role that probably could have been played by any tough guy actor of a certain age. But, Willis still brings his cocky charm to the role. (Seeing Willis here really drives home just how different he was in the final films that he did for Emmett.) Willis plays Biggs with a sense of humor and it’s just what the movie needed.

To say a movie is better than expected can sound like a backhanded compliment but it’s a compliment nonetheless. Setup was definitely better than I expected.

Film Review: Gun (dir by Jessy Terrero)

Posted on March 25, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Angel (Val Kilmer) has just been released from prison and he’s returned to the hard streets of Detroit. Hooking up with his old friend Rich (50 Cent), Angel gets involved in a gun-running operation.

Unfortunately, it’s no longer easy or safe to sell guns in Detroit. The police are cracking down. Rival gun dealers are trying to take out a competition. A raid at a club leaves a dealer dead and a huge power void in Detroit’s criminal underworld. When it becomes obvious that the police have a snitch in Rich’s crew, Rich’s girlfriend (AnnaLynne McCord) suspects that it’s Angel. Can Rich find the snitch without having to betray his best friend? And does Angel have secrets of his own?

First released in 201o, Gun was the third film that Val Kilmer made with 50 Cent and it’s apparently their only collaboration that Kilmer didn’t mention in his autobiography. It probably should be noted that Val Kilmer doesn’t look particularly happy in the movie but that actually works for his character. Angel has just gotten out of prison, he’s mourning his wife, and he’s found himself right in the middle of the type of violent situation that could lead to him going back to prison. In many ways, Angel feels like he could be a version of Heat’s Chris Shiherlis. It’d easy to imagine that maybe Chris changed his name after escaping Los Angeles. He became Angel and he found a new partner in the form of Rich. Unfortunately, Detroit is a lot uglier than Los Angeles, Rich is no Neil McCauley, and Michael Mann’s not directing. Kilmer’s performance is not bad. Even in a low-budget movie like this, he still did his best.

That said, the film is centered around 50 Cent. 50 Cent plays Rich. 50 Cent provides the music. 50 Cent produced the film, along with Randall Emmett, a producer who largely made a career out of getting faded stars to appear in B-movies. (He’s best-known for producing the many of Bruce Willis’s final films.) As Rich, 50 Cent gives a rather stiff performance. It’s not so much that he’s not convincing as a street smart gun dealer as he’s just not very interesting to watch. There’s a predictability to his performance, one that is reflected in the songs that appear on the film’s soundtrack. How many rap songs about making money and shooting people can one listen to before admitting that it all gets boring after a while?

In the end, the most interesting thing about Gun is the number of familiar faces who appear in small roles. James Remar plays a cop. Paul Calderon, the bartender from Pulp Fiction and the traitor from King of New York, plays a detective. John Larroquette and, somewhat inevitably, Danny Trejo both make appearances. Perhaps most oddly, Mike “Boogie” Malin, the winner of Big Brother All-Stars, plays an ATF agent. I should mention that, in real life, Boogie Mike and Dr. Will Kirby (winner of Big Brother 2) had a friendship that widely mirrored the friendship between Rich and Angel. I doubt that factored into his casting. That would be giving Gun to much credit.

Gun was not a particularly compelling film, though it did win some authenticity points by actually being shot on location in Michigan. That said, Val Kilmer gave a better performance than perhaps the material deserved. Val is definitely missed.

Film Review: Edison (dir by David J. Burke)

Posted on March 25, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

In the town of Edison, a reporter named Pollack (Justin Timberlake) is convinced that he’s uncovered evidence of massive police corruption. His editor, Moses Ashford (Morgan Freeman), responds by firing Pollack but then rehires him on the condition that he actually do the work and interview everyone involved. Pollack is confused until he sees that Ashford has a Pulitzer Prize in his Edison bachelor pad.

FRAT stands for First Response Assault and Tactical. Led by Captian Tilman (John Heard) and protected by duplicitous politician Jack Reigert (Cary Elwes), FRAT has made Edison safe but at what cost? The constitution is regularly trampled. Drug dealers are summarily executed. Sgt. Lazaerov (Dylan McDermott) confiscates and uses the drugs himself while the newest recruit, Detective Deeds (LL Cool J), worries that he’ll be executed when he declines to lie in court. Deeds has reason to be worried because he witnesses the attempted assassination of both Pollack and his girlfriend (Piper Perabo).

Teaming up with Detective Leon Wallace (Kevin Spacey), Pollack and Ashford try to get Deeds to turn on FRAT and expose the trouble in Edison.

First released in 2005, Edison was produced by Randall Emmett, who is today best-known for producing (and occasionally directing) Bruce Willis’s final films. Emmett specializes in getting name actors to play small roles in what are otherwise B-movies. In an Emmett film, De Niro, Stallone, Travolta, or Nicolas Cage might get top billing but usually, they only have a few minutes of screentime. Edison is unique in that Morgan Freeman and Kevin Spacey (who was still considered to be a big name back in 2005) both actually have fairly large roles. Though LL Cool J and Justin Timberlake are the stars of the film, it still appears that it probably took Freeman and Spacey longer than a day to shoot their scenes and that truly does set this film apart from other Emmett productions. I should also note that Spacey wears an incredibly tacky hairpiece while Freeman gets an extended dance scene set to Time Has Come Today by The Chambers Brothers.

Is the film itself any good? Eh, not really. It’s a bit disjointed. John Heard was a good actor but this movie was made when he was at the height of his “9-11 was an inside job” nuttiness and he gives a cartoonish performance as the main bad guy. Cary Elwes is entertaining as the crooked politician but it’s hard not to feel that the film would have been more interesting if he and Kevin Spacey had switched roles. LL Cool J is not particularly convincing as a cop so naive that he’s shocked to discover that there’s corruption on the force. As for Justin Timberlake, this was actually his debut as an actor. Timberlake is always at his best playing morally shady characters, like in Alpha Dog or The Social Network. In this film, he has to play earnest and outraged and he’s never particularly convincing. If anything, he comes across as being a little whiny.

That said, the idea behind Edison is at least interesting. FRAT — like countless other special police units in the country — has become untouchable by actually doing its job. The streets are safer, as long as you don’t get on FRAT’s bad side. Who watches the watchmen? Edison asked this now common question in 2005, when America was still embracing the survelliance state. Flaws and all, Edison was ahead of its time.