Jumper

Jumper is a frustrating movie.

It’s beautifully shot, with an intriguing premise, and a great performance from Samuel L. Jackson. Unfortunately, it’s also got some cringe worthy dialog and distractingly large plot holes.

The plot concerns a young man, played by Hayden Christensen, with the ability to teleport, who finds himself at war with a secret sect lead by a mysterious man played by Samuel L. Jackson.

The film looks great, featuring some terrific location photography, but the plot is a hodgepodge of underdeveloped elements.

Diane Lane gets third billing for about five minutes of screen time in a throwaway role with no payoff. Jamie Bell, easily the best of the cast aside from Jackson, crafts a far more interesting character than lead Christensen, but the script (credited to three different writers) regulates him to little more than a plot device. Love interest Rachel Bilson suffers the worst, as her characgter seems like an afterthought meant to check a demographic box.

There are moments where Jumper gets it right. The opening sequence, leading up to Christensen’s character’s discovery of his powers it spot-on, as are just about every one of Jackson’s scenes, but these only serve to build false hope. This is a movie in search of an identity. Is it a super-hero movie? A romance? A sci-fi epic? Jumper feels like a movie made by a committee hell-bent on creating a franchise and that, ultimately, proves to be its undoing. Much as Jackson’s character is fond of saying that no man should be all places at all times; no movie should be all things to all people.