DAVID BELLE AND PAUL WALKER IN BRICK MANSIONS

The ghetto saved again

David Belle is back, the leading figure of the wall-jumping chase art of parkour, in this remake of the 2004 French film District B13/Banlieu 13, which he was also a costar of, this time set in Detroit instead of Paris. This spinoff from the Luc Besson genre factory takes us around in circles, being an American-set copy of a French film based on American action models. It lacks the intensity and enthusiasm of District 13, or its feeling of place, and some parts of the original plot seem patched-on to the US setting, but it's still fun. One of the points of it is just to display Belle's mastery of parcour, greater than ever. It's also a last chance to see the late Paul Walker, playing, appropriately, the soulful good-guy cop who helps expose the corrupt police administration and city government -- and ups his level of physical action from his Fast and Furious roles to keep up with Belle. District 13, by the way, already had a 2009 French remake-sequel with the same crew, District 13: Ultimatum, with more parkour, more action, and less interesting dialogue. Luc Besson, who has many projects, is the mastermind behind all of these, writing or co-writing, recycling, sometimes watering down his own material, though it arguably had its seeds in two films he didn't write or produce, Matthieu Kassowitz's socially-conscious Hate/La haine (1995 ) and Jean-François Richet's Marxist-inspired and rap-flavored Ma 6-T va crack-er (1997), which are linked with the origins of parkour.

You may wonder about the new venue. Isn't all Detroit pretty much a ghetto now? The idea of breathing new life into any part of this town or cleaning up its city government may seem premature. But the populist, muckraking theme that comes here originated in the earlier movie. Again as in the first film the mayor is planning to blow up the ghetto, walled up this time somewhere to one side rather than on the outer rim, and this time to turn it into luxury housing. The plot and characters are largely the same, with new cast. Belle, his name changed from Leïto to Lino, is the ghetto rebel asked to go in with Damien (Walker), and wrest the stolen nuclear device from the ghetto drug kingpin now called Tremaine (rap lord RZA, who delivers his lines with a splendid artificiality). He's no longer called Taha; Arabs have been replaced by blacks. The giant hulk type (Groucy Boy) has the original's Arabic punning name K-2 (Qader), but it's lost its point.

What Brick Mansions tells is the story of a ghetto rebel who unites with an honest cop to foil a plot to destroy property and wipe out poor people, exposing city corruption. "Brick Mansions," walled off rom the rest of the city, has already lost its schools and police protection; a drug lord dominates it and makes the law. When Lino and Damien defuse the bomb and expose the plot of the crooked mayor (Richard Zeman), the inner city has hope again. Somehow this doesn't make as much sense as a theme as it did in the French versions. Not for the first time, the real facts of today's Detroit have been neglected here. And otherwise, Besson's themes don't translate; he lacks a feel for the American environment, and his second-rank director Camille Delamarre isn't much help. The action is great, but the shooting and editing blur it more than the French films -- maybe that's meant to appeal to a jaded audience that now is now more familiar with parkour films (such as Casino Royale) and TV commercials.

Some car racing has been thrown in for Walker, the only actor who provides a new feel to this enjoyable but otherwise routine remake. In one scene Damien tells Lino, "Put on your seat belt," and Lino refuses saying "I prefer to be free." But after he sees how fast and wild Damien drives, he puts the belt on after all. When he objects, Damien says "You do the driving then," and turns the wheel over to him, endangering them more. Walker allows RZA to steal the scenes they're in together, and he gamely keeps up with Belle's acrobatic fighting and stunts, though bypassing some of the impossible-looking jumps. But what Walker provides, as he did in the Fast & Furious series that will feel his lack enormously, is a core of calm, niceness, and lightheartedness. And when he bonds with the combative Lino after all their sometimes over-the-top sparring, it feels natural because Walker was an actor who seemed easy in his skin and with others. When this film ends with a photo of Walker and "In loving memory," it feels heart-breaking. The man had class. When he drives back into the revived ghetto he's in a black Porsche sport car, which has a sad logic: he died in a Porsche, though a much more expensive and dangerous one.

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©Chris Knipp. Blog: http://chrisknipp.blogspot.com/.