The Big Bounce

What’s the Story?

In THE BIG BOUNCE, sticky-fingered surf bum Jack Ryan (Owen Wilson) loses his job for bashing the boss with a baseball bat. He gets a new job as a sort of handyman for some bungalows owned by Judge Crewes (Morgan Freeman). He meets a beautiful woman named Nancy (Sara Foster) who has a weakness for men who have a weakness, and the next thing you know everyone is trying to double-cross everyone else over $250,000 in cash. It's supposed to be used to pay some goons to beat up the people who are protesting a development owned by a mean guy who is Nancy's boyfriend. But Nancy wants Jack to steal it. "All you have to do," she purrs, "is walk in poor and walk out rich."

Is It Any Good?

The Big Bounce wants to be comic caper movie, but the real crime is inflicted on the Elmore Leonard book credited with inspiring it. You can tell that somewhere in there there's a book with colorful characters and a couple of lines of dialogue that crackle. There is some evidence that there was an actual plot of some kind. At some point. But not now.

Wilson, who always looks like a surf bum in whatever part he is playing, finally gets to play a surf bum and is surprisingly uninteresting in the part. Foster has some spirit and Freeman's bemused spin makes his lines feel fresh and he adds a little class. But the movie feels recut by people who weren't sure what tone they were trying for, and the result is just bland.