YNOT at the Movies

The amazingly capable protagonist is Roy Miller (Tom Cruise), a formal CIA spy now a fugitive. Under the close watchful eyes from the CIA agents, he meets June Havens (Cameron Diaz) at the airport, who is on her way to her sister's wedding. For reasons unknown to June, as well as to the audience, June is dragged into Roy's mission to recover a super-powered battery invented by geeky Simon Feck (Paul Dano), and to prevent the battery from falling into European arm manufacturer's hand. They travel from Boston to a remote island, to Europe, and back to Boston, in fast moving forms of transportation, including airplanes, trains, cars, motorcycles, even on foot. They are constantly under intense fire. Yet, they are always miraculously on time, appear magically where they want to be, and easily accomplish the mission impossible.

Director James Mangold mixes action, romance, comedy, and suspension all together in this film. It seems that his main objective is to entertain the audience, while he holds his breath hoping that nobody asks any question about the holes in the story. He succeeds in the entertaining part, to a degree. The chemistry between Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz also greatly helps his objective and creates comic moments. Without them, the audience will be left no choice but to focus on the sloppy plot.

During the first half of the film, Tom Cruise manipulates Cameron Diaz's every move as if she is a dummy puppet. Luckily, Diaz emerges and gains control, and shoots. She even tails the incredible Tom Cruise to a restaurant and over hears his whispering behind a closed restaurant window—she must be an undercover spy herself, and she makes Tom Cruise look like a fake, contrary to how he flies around in other scenes!

Wait, let's not pick on those details. Instead, sit back mindlessly and watch Tom Cruise crashing an airplane. It is actually pretty cool, and a lot fun.

"Knight and Day" opens on Wednesday, June 23, 2010 at Bay Area theaters.