Jack Ryan (Owen Wilson) is your typical surfer dude in Hawaii, except he has also has a background as a thief, mostly small breaking and entering crimes where he leaves with his pockets aligned with decent cash and maybe some valuables here and there. After hitting construction foreman Lou Harris (Vinnie Jones), who works for a corrupt island Ray Ritchie (Gary Sinise), in the head with a bat, both Harris and the Ritchie's assistant Bob Rogers Jr. (Charlie Sheen) want Ryan to leave the island asap.However, a resort bungalow owner and local judge Walter Crewes (Morgan Freeman) takes a liking to Jack's laidback ways, and employs him at his resort as a handymen. This gives Jack and opportunity to get closer to Nancy Hayes (Sara Foster), a bad girl who knows how to smile and bat her eyes the right way around town. "She likes the criminal type," Walter warns Jack, but Jack doesn't listen and begins to hang around with Nancy, pulling off petty heists like the kind he is used to. Nancy wants more excitement, though. It isn't long before she gets the idea to stage a $200,000 heist on Ritchie.The Big Bounce is based off of Elmore Leonard's novel of the same name, but instead of taking place in the Michigan Thumb the story was moved to the shore of Oahu. This definitely makes the film more pleasing to look at and appealing in aesthetic, but it can't shake the fact that this film is meandering, far too directionless, and very dry as a whole. The film lacks energy and mystery for being a heist movie and adopts a persona about as lax and as breezy as its main character and location.I often haven't read many of the books when I review their film counterparts, so all I can do is tactfully assume what Leonard's novel contained. Two of the key ingredients for a crime novel are interest and, at least, some clarity of the overall mystery. The Big Bounce has a lot of characters, who are interesting on a basic level, but never seem to channel anything but basic archetypes. The actors work with what they have in their respective roles, sure, but if they were paid by lesser-known, second-rate actors, would you remember them just as well? Owen Wilson does some fine work, and Sara Foster, for her first time, channels the sexiness someone like Hayden Panettiere but possesses the personality of an Olsen twin. Arguably the best performance in the film is given by Morgan Freeman but, really, is that much of a surprise? There is a scene right near the end that has two characters, a man and a woman who should remain unspoiled, and the woman is talking to the man, confused about what their plan of action is now that they're about to be exposed. She keeps questioning the plan and the man continues to correct her. She only gets more and more confused. I think this is the closest the film comes with connecting the audience because nothing in The Big Bounce is clarified to the point of being digestible to the audience. By the end, I was trying to piece together what the ultimate goal of all of this was and what both parties were trying to achieve. Usually, in a crime drama, this is what the filmmakers want you to be doing, except instead of feeling like I had all the pieces somewhere in front of me, it felt as if I had a ten-piece puzzle and three pieces were on the floor, two were mistakenly thrown out, two were falsely advertized, and I was left with three that may or may not have been from the puzzle on the box. And so The Big Bounce goes on, and on, for a surprisingly short eighty-one minutes, going from mildly-interesting, to dull, to boring, to amusing, to somewhat funny, and the cycle repeats. Eventually, it becomes more of a scenery-chewing project for several talented actors who occasionally could be mistaken for contemplating better role choices in their future during this movie.Starring: Owen Wilson, Sara Foster, Morgan Freeman, Charlie Sheen, Gary Sinise, Vinnie Jones, Bebe Neuwirth, Willie Nelson, and Harry Dean Stanton. Directed by: George Armitage.

When I saw this movie I hadn't heard much about it, and if I had heard something, I might not have seen it. That wouldn't have been such a bad thing!There are some good actors in this movie (Freeman and Sinise), unfortunately we don't see them much. Then there are a couple of semi-good actors (Sara Foster, Charlie Sheen) and we see much too much of them. Then there are a couple of "underdogs", actors that we don't expect a lot from, and we don't see them much either (willie Nelson, Vinnie Jones) and that's a shame because they actually deliver some of the movies funniest and/or most credible performances.What about Owen Wilson you ask? Well, he's Owen Wilson, just the way he is Owen Wilson in a lot of other not so good movies that have only reached large audiences because of his name (Drilbit Taylor; You, Me and Dupree; Marley and Me). No, don't get me wrong, he's not bad, he's almost never bad, but he's just not that good either.And then what about the plot? To be perfectly honest I think that there might just have been enough plot for about 45 minutes, tops, and that might actually have improved the movie, which is unbearably slow paced at times and not at all the LOL-comedy it tries to be!So no, when you ask me so directly I have to say that I would not recommend it unless you want a perfectly harmless movie with so little plot that you can make out with a boy- or girlfriend half the time and not miss much...

It's movies like this that give modern-day films a reputation as "garbage," especially among classic-film lovers. I try to defend today's movies to them when they tell me today's movies are all morally bankrupt. Well, in this case, I have no rebuttal. I agree, this is another example of a modern effort that puts too much stock on the sleaze and winds up on the weak side of being classy. It's also another good example of a PG-13 movie that should have been rated "R." There are tons of examples of that in the last 15 years. Parents: be more leery of PG-13 than another rating. Usually, a movie that features crime and comedy is going to be either really good or really bad, depending on the quality of the jokes. Here, very little was funny and by halfway, I could care less about the crime angle. If you are to inject humor into a heist story, make sure it works, or you are going to wind up with a mess like this. Also, the movie seemed to be more of an environmental propaganda piece than anything else. Did Al Gore have a hand in this? It would explain how boring this wound up and all the bias. It just looks as if the filmmakers didn't know what direction go to and wound up with a sub-par performance in all the categories.Owen Wilson plays a smart-ass surfer dude. If his character "Jack Ryan" is the hero of this film, it's no wonder I got turned off in a hurry. I didn't find him a "likable guy," as some others did: just a wise guy who had the cute answers to everything. I have found Wilson to be similar to the crime-comedy genre: he's either very entertaining or very annoying.Speaking of actors, I was very disappointed to see two of my favorites - Gary Sinise and Morgan Freeman - involved with this turkey.I don't blame Wilson for everything. He didn't write the dialog. He didn't cast Sara Foster as the lead female. He didn't write a screenplay in which none of the characters are likable enough for us to care about them. At least I have company as I see most other reviewers here thought this movie stunk, too.

We are in Hawái , there Jack Ryan a young ex-con who gets fired from his employment ,then he takes another job as handyman and cleaner of a judge and local hotel proprietary called Sam (Morgan Freeman). Meanwhile , he is enamored by a shady and gorgeous woman named Nancy (Sara Foster), she's lover to an unscrupulous mobster called Ritchie (Gary Sinese). Nancy proposes Jack to help her with the robbery Ritchie's safe with supposedly big amount of money. He reluctantly help her , but problems ,double-crosses , risks and dangers are arising.The film mingles intrigue , black comedy with cynical sense of humor , action , suspense and exotic landscapes including shores , islands , and beaches from Hawaii . The movie contains several ingredients for amusement and entertainment such as surf , yachts , sunny outdoors and sexy girls wearing T-shirt and bikinis . Owen Wilson as sympathetic drifter is nice and Sara Foster as sulky and seductive young is awesome . However, Morgan Freeman and Gary Sinese are miscast , but they usually play intelligent and upright roles . Other secondary actors as Charlie Sheen , Willie Nelson , Vinnie Jones , Bebe Neuwirth and Harry Dean Stanton are well. Wonderful outdoors and lush interiors are beautifully photographed by Jeffrey L. Kimball and lively and atmospheric music by George S Clinton . Screenplay by Elmo Leonard ,an old novelist and screenwriter specialist on noir plots and western and working from ¨Tall T¨,¨3:10 Yuma¨,¨Hombre¨ continuing with ¨Rosary murders¨, ¨Get shorty¨, ¨Jackie Brown¨ till nowadays . This film was previously adapted by Alex March (1969) with Ryan O'Neal and Leigh Taylor Young . Motion picture was regularly directed by George Armitage . Rating : Average but with lots of fun for the entire youth and it will appeal to noir comedy fans .