Chev Chelios is played with a frantic, almost animalistic passion by action film regular Jason Statham (“The Transporter” series). While Chelios supposedly died at the end of the first film, the new villains in this second entry manage to revive him, take his heart, and replace it with an artificial one. The rest of the film is Chelios chasing the bad guys who stole his heart around the city, trying to get it back. The artificial heart Chelios is stuck with has a short battery life; upon escaping he needs to constantly find ways to recharge it. Each of these recharging methods becomes more outlandish and unbelievable.
Whereas the first film is a never-ending adrenaline rush, this film sputters and eventually dies from a sloppy editing style, its unnecessary inclusion of scenes with supporting characters, and an unwillingness to take the subject matter seriously. “Crank 2” manages to parody its predecessor, tearing apart it’s own internal reality. In part one, Chelios was determined and frustrated but never completely out of control. The character transformation in “Crank 2” is not an improvement. He loses that personal connection to the audience through his outrageous antics. Originally, Chelios was at peace with the likelihood of his impending death and simply wanted to take out as many of the people responsible in his time remaining. In “Crank: High Voltage” Chelios is a running punch line with the audience as the butt end of the joke.
Amy Smart (“Just Friends”) returns to play his girlfriend, Eve, who is now working as a stripper and surprised to see her boyfriend alive. Eve has changed since his “death,” becoming self-sufficient, kind of slutty, and a lot less likeable. Smart originally added a humanizing, relaxing presence to the craziness of the story but her return adds nothing to this new film. The Eve side-story is an unwelcome diversion to the primary plot. None of the villains are worthy of naming in this new Chelios adventure, except the return of a body-less bad guy from part one. The movie switches from hard to believe into ludicrous mode with a talking head submerged in a fish tank.
“Crank” was sexually explicit and violent but all precaution is lifted in the new movie, with a prolonged, extremely indecent sex scene and some unnecessary self-mutilation sequences. With all that was included somehow the director manages not to resolve the underlying storyline, unceremoniously including the resolution of the heart chase during the end credits. We are treated to an upraised middle finger after a poorly staged gun battle, from Chelios, proving to me the director’s utter disregard for his own creation and the cost of our tickets.
Rated R for frenetic strong bloody violence throughout, crude and graphic sexual content, nudity and pervasive language.
