Homefront (film)

Homefront is a 2013 American action thriller film directed by Gary Fleder and released nationwide in theaters on November 27.[4] Based on the 2005 novel Homefront, the film stars Jason Statham, James Franco, Winona Ryder, and Kate Bosworth. Filming began on October 1, 2012 in New Orleans.

Not to be confused with Home Front (film).

Homefront
Theatrical release poster
Directed byGary Fleder
Produced by
Screenplay bySylvester Stallone
Based onHomefront
by Chuck Logan
Starring
Music byMark Isham
CinematographyTheo van de Sande
Edited byPadraic McKinley
Production
company
Millennium Films
Nu Image
Endgame Releasing
Distributed byOpen Road Films
Release date
  • November 27, 2013 (2013-11-27) (United States)
Running time
100 minutes[1]
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$22 million[2]
Box office$51.7 million[3]

Plot

Two years after the raids of a gang's methamphetamine laboratory where his cover was blown, retired DEA Agent and U.S. war veteran, Phil Broker (Jason Statham) and his daughter Maddy (Izabela Vidovic) have moved to a small Louisiana town where Maddy's deceased mother grew up. Maddy gets into a schoolyard fight with a bully named Teddy Klum (Austin Craig); when Broker comes to the school, Teddy's hostile father, Jimmy (Marcus Hester), picks a fight with him and loses. Teddy's mother, Cassie (Kate Bosworth), later asks her brother, a drug dealer named Gator Bodine (James Franco), to scare Broker.

Broker fights off a few of Gator's thugs at a gas station when they threaten him. While he and Maddy later go horse riding, Gator breaks into their house. He deduces from old personnel files that Broker was the undercover cop responsible for the arrest of Danny T (Chuck Zito) in the raid two years earlier, which also resulted in the death of Danny T's son Joey. Hoping to get a wider distribution for the drugs he manufactures, Gator tips off Danny T, who sends members of his gang to kill Broker.

Broker finds Gator's meth lab and sabotages it. He is captured and tortured by the same thugs he fought off earlier, but manages to get free and beat them again before escaping. As he and Maddy are preparing to leave, the gang members arrive. One of the gang members goes to the barn and engages in a fight with Teedo, which ends when the latter kills him with a pitchfork, but is seriously injured himself. In the scuffle, Broker manages to kill most of the gang members, and Maddy is kidnapped by Gator's girlfriend, Sheryl (Winona Ryder), but not before she calls the police. She uses her cell phone to call her dad and, from her descriptions, Broker realizes that she has been taken to Gator's meth lab.

Cassie arrives at Gator's warehouse with news of the gunfight. When she discovers Maddy there, she accidentally sets off the booby trap that Broker has set up. The lab and much of the warehouse explode, and Gator watches his business go up in flames. Disgusted with her brother, Cassie attempts to flee with Maddy, leading to a scuffle that ends when Gator accidentally shoots Cassie. As he flees with Maddy in his truck, Broker chases him in a police cruiser until he crashes it. Stuck on a bridge closed off by the sheriff, Broker is injured from crashing the car and Gator nearly kills Broker, but he is distracted by Maddy, who he tries to scare into looking away. Taking advantage, Broker frees himself before he savagely beats and ridicules Gator, even pointing a gun to his head. With a look, Maddy silently pleads her father not to kill Gator and Broker relents, telling him that his life was just saved by his daughter.

Gator and Sheryl are arrested and both Teedo and Cassie are taken to the hospital. Broker later visits Danny T in prison, letting him know that he will be around when Danny T is eventually released.

Cast

Production

Development and writing

The screenplay was written by Sylvester Stallone based on the novel of the same name by writer Chuck Logan. It was originally intended as a starring role for Stallone but he passed on the role to Statham staying on as producer.[5]

Reception

Box office

Homefront grossed $6.9 million in its opening weekend, finishing in 5th place. It finished its theatrical run with a total gross of $51.7 million, against its $22 million production budget.[3]

Critical response

On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 43% based on 115 reviews, with an average rating of 4.97/10. The site's critical consensus states: "While it boasts a capable cast, the disappointingly dull Homefront hearkens back to classic action thrillers without adding anything to the genre."[6] On Metacritic the film has a weighted average score of 40 out of 100, based on 35 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".[7] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B" on an A+ to F scale.[8]

Scott Foundas of Variety magazine notes the reliable presence of Statham, but blames director Gary Fleder for "making an incoherent jumble of most of the action scenes". He calls Bosworth's performance the film's "greatest surprise", and Franco's performance as its "biggest disappointment". Foundas calls the film "surprisingly joyless" and "less than the sum of its parts."[5]

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References
  1. "HOMEFRONT (15)". Lions Gate Entertainment. British Board of Film Classification. October 9, 2013. Retrieved October 9, 2013.
  2. "Homefront (2013)". Box Office Mojo. Internet Movie Database. November 27, 2013. Retrieved March 25, 2014.
  3. "Homefront (2013) – Financial Information". The Numbers.
  4. Open Films (June 20, 2013). "Open Road Pushes Back Machete Kills and Homefront". ComingSoon.net. Retrieved September 13, 2013.
  5. Scott Foundas (November 21, 2013). "Film Review: 'Homefront'". Variety magazine. Retrieved December 14, 2018.
  6. "Homefront". Rotten Tomatoes. Fandango Media. Retrieved August 9, 2020.
  7. "Homefront Reviews". Metacritic. CBS Interactive. Retrieved December 15, 2018.
  8. "CinemaScore". CinemaScore. Archived from the original on July 22, 2018. Retrieved December 14, 2018.
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