Iron Man 3

And so Marvel’s Phase Two begins, with a crash, a bang, a wallop and, strangely enough, the unmistakable, toe-tapping intro to Eiffel 65’s late-’90s Europop hit, “I’m Blue (Da Ba Dee, Da Ba Da).” “Iron Man 3” is Marvel Studio’s first theatrical release since their epic superhero team-up “The Avengers” kicked movie-goers’ butts in the summer of 2012 (and in doing so, raked in over $1 billion at the international box office), and it was feared that everyone's favourite man-in-a-can would crumble under the immense weight of Joss Whedon’s huge-scale juggernaut - just how would Tony Stark’s next solo outing fare without the rest of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes tagging along for the ride?

Quite well, it turns out: co-written and directed by legendary “Lethal Weapon” scribe and “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang” helmer Shane Black - as should be obvious from the get-go, what with Robert Downey, Jr.'s meta-riffic opening narration and the otherwise inexplicable Christmastime setting - this first film in the build-up to 2015’s “The Avengers 2” stands sturdily and mightily on its own two feet, bursting with personality, sizzling with wicked humour, soaring with high-octane thrills and packing an almighty wallop of a plot twist that’s guaranteed to split the comic-book crowd in two - in the age of pesky internet spoilers and overly revelatory studio marketing, it’s refreshing to see a blockbuster with genuine shocks and surprises in store.

Most surprising of all though, is how mature Marvel’s latest output is - have you ever seen a superhero movie tackling the harrowing effects of PTSD? That’s what super-snarky superhero Tony Stark is having to deal with, and it’s turned his high life upside down: following his near-death experience in New York (i.e. the alien-busting finale of “The Avengers,” wherein Tony travelled through a wormhole into space), the self-described “genius, playboy, billionaire, philanthropist” is now an insomniac, frightened for the safety of his beloved Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow), crippled by anxiety attacks and spending his nights in the basement of his ocean-view pad, obsessively building new armours to help keep his mind busy and distracted.

As it turns out, he has more to worry about than panic attacks and sleep deprivation: hooded, ethnically nondescript terrorist mastermind The Mandarin, played with chilling, scenery-chewing menace by British thesp Sir Ben Kingsley (clearly having a ball), is hijacking the American airwaves, broadcasting hyper-edited videos in which he threatens to teach the American populace a lesson or two - chiefly by bombing the US to kingdom come. Aiding the Mandarin in his reign of terror is Aldrich Killian (Guy Pearce, “Lockout”), a slimy, devilishly handsome scientist whose science experiment Extremis is sure to get Tony hot under the collar: a biological enhancement, it either a) transforms its subject into a nigh-unstoppable, auto-repairing T-1000 crossed with a lava lamp, or b) turns its subject into a walking lava bomb, a bug the Mandarin has been using to stage untracable terror attacks.

And when a loyal friend is caught in one of these attacks and sent into a coma, Tony publicly swears revenge, a move that sees his swanky Malibu home visited by a trio of attack-choppers, blasted by missiles and sent hurtling down the side of a cliff. This is portrayed in a spectacular action set-piece - one of many - which leaves Tony armourless, homeless and stranded in the middle of nowhere, Tennessee, forced to rely on his wits rather than his fire-power to survive.

This is a development that’s crucial to the success of “Iron Man 3:” though its predecessors solved the potential problem of the Iron Man exoskeleton being an impersonal CG creation with the ingenious device of an in-helmet face-cam, “Iron Man 3” goes one step further, keeping Tony out of his metal suit for the majority of the action. This leaves Downey, Jr. to be Downey, Jr., stripped of the armour he so naturally outshines and given a few extra doses of vulnerability. Add to that the possibility of Tony’s recent mental instability meaning he could at any second be reduced to a quivering wreck, and you’ve got yourself a compelling action hero, faults and all.

Also crucial is the involvement of Black, whose dialogue (written alongside Scottish newbie Drew Pearce) fizzes with wit and who brings to the proceedings a subversive quality: constantly, expectations are defied, be it through Tony’s amusingly harsh remarks to a friendless, fatherless boy he’s just befriended (young Ty Simpkins, wonderful), or through a rug pull that catches us off-guard and instantly reshapes our entire understanding of the plot. Then, of course, there’s the buddy-cop element for which Black is most famous, and which he practically invented in 1987, here shared between loose-cannon Tony and straight-arrow Rhodes (Don Cheadle), aka War Machine, aka Iron Patriot; bantering and bickering together amidst fiery chaos, they’re like a 21st century Riggs and Murtaugh, albeit clad in weaponised metal suits.

And then, of course, there’s the grand finale, which leaps and dives through the levels of an abandoned oil rig and which damn near gives “The Avengers"' climax a run for its money (and that’s quite a hefty sum): it may not have a Hulk, but it has a Hulkbuster, along with the rest of the toys Tony’s been tinkering with in his basement, finally taken out for a spin to do battle with indestructible volcano people. It was a problem with director Jon Favreau’s previous instalments that their climaxes consisted of monotonous, “Transformers”-esque robot-bashing-robot action. This one blows the both of them out of the water, with Tony out of his armour, bloodied and bashed, and fighting like a human being - for once, an “Iron Man" movie nears its finishing line with a genuine sense of peril, and we’re gripped at every second.

It’s hinted at in the film’s final moments that this may be the final “Iron Man” movie. If this is true (and one doubts it very much), then Mr Stark has gone out on an all-time high: “Iron Man 3” is the best of the “Iron Man” movies, Black giving the clunky “Iron Man 2” a good, hard kick up the backside and tying up the trilogy in a neat and tidy bow while looking ahead to the future. It’s not perfect - Rebecca Hall’s Maya Hansen, an old flame of Tony’s and employee of Killian, is cruelly short-changed with minimal screen-time - but it’s difficult to imagine Phase Two getting off to a more exciting start. Put simply, Cap, Thor and the yet-to-be-unveiled Guardians of the Galaxy have their work cut out in topping Tony’s third, and possibly final, adventure. But if anyone can do it, it’s Marvel.

9/10

Olympus Has Fallen

‘“Die Hard” in the White House’ was presumably the six-word pitch for Antoine Fuqua’s “Olympus Has Fallen,” a brawny action blockbuster which, given how piss-poor John McClane’s 2013 Russian vacation turned out, can pride itself as the best darn “Die Hard” movie of the year so far. Standing in for Nakatomi Plaza, 1600 Penn is under siege: following a devastating airborne assault on D.C. that results in the legs-crossing destruction of the famously phallic Washington Monument, North Korean goons armed with guns and grenades storm the White House and take hunky President Asher (Aaron Eckhart, “Rabbit Hole”) hostage in the building’s impenetrable underground bunker.

Their goal: get the US government to order the retreat of Western forces in Korea while extracting nuclear launch codes from the President and his staff. If the government fails to comply, Mr President gets it in the back of the head. Enter Mike Banning (Gerard Butler, “Playing for Keeps”), an ex-Secret Service agent who sneaks in through the front door unnoticed during the initial attack and whose very particular set of skills sure come in handy: one by one, he takes out the terrorist scumbags like an unstoppable cross between John McClane and Jack Bauer, albeit with a Scottish brogue dancing merrily on the tip of his supposedly all-American tongue.

Watching “Olympus Has Fallen," one can’t help but recall just how great John McTiernan’s ‘88 action masterpiece really was: not just thrilling Friday-night entertainment, it boasted a bravura, star-making performance from Bruce Willis and was particularly impressive in how it maintained a perfect balance between McClane’s cocky heroics, Cali’s clueless police force and Alan Rickman’s smarmy villainy. Fuqua’s film doesn’t quite nail that balance, with Banning’s butt-kicking not as prominent as it should be, and frankly, Butler’s no Brucie. Yet the film is enjoyable, with the action refreshingly brutal and bloody, Rick Yune (“Die Another Day”) making for a coldly sinister villain and Butler getting in some memorable wise-ass cracks: “How about we play a game of fuck off?” he snaps at Yune’s terrorist mastermind via walkie talkie. “You go first.” Fuqua, meanwhile, keeps the action tough, tense and pleasingly preposterous, though it’s often let down by crummy VFX — considering the $70 million budget, you’d think Fuqua and his crew could afford digital effects rendered after the turn of the century.

Coincidentally, another ‘“Die Hard” in the White House’ flick is coming in September: Roland Emmerich’s “White House Down,” which, in a bold move, dresses leading man Channing Tatum in McClane’s iconic muddied wife-beater. Beating “Olympus Has Fallen” in the fun department would be a fair, if not extraordinary feat, but topping its corny, flag-waving jingoism will be tough: count the number of times Old Glory is seen fluttering majestically in the wind while a drum-martial score thunders triumphantly in the background. Oh, and there’s a scene in the Oval Office where Butler bashes a badguy’s brains in with an iron bust of Abraham Lincoln. God bless America.

6/10

Oblivion

American commercials director Joseph Kosinski made an ambitious feature debut in 2010 with Disney’s “TRON: Legacy,” the anticipated sequel to the game-changing 1982 cult sci-fi flick “TRON” which, both in spite of and because of the hype, proved a disappointment for many: though visually dazzling, it was emotionally vacant and featured a leading performance so wooden it could be boxed up and sold at IKEA. Kosinski’s follow-up, a $120-million sci-fi thriller adapted from his unpublished graphic novel “Oblivion,” is a minor upgrade, flaunting big ideas, an intriguing plot and a leading actor who isn’t Garrett Hedlund. But for the second time in a row, Kosinski has directed a film that, while pleasingly designed and technically impressive, lacks the necessary spark to bring it to life — the result, once again, is a stunning spectacle, but a sterile one.

Set in the year 2077, “Oblivion” imagines a future Earth reduced to a nigh-uninhabitable, post-apocalyptic wasteland following a thwarted but catastrophic attack by alien invaders. What’s left of civilisation now hovers above the globe in a giant, upside-down pyramid while our planet’s last remaining resources are carefully extracted. Tom Cruise (“Jack Reacher”) is Jack Harper, a former astronaut tasked with repairing the unmanned drones that hunt down hostile alien life forms in the desolate American East Coast, as monitored from a palace in the sky by communications officer Victoria (Andrea Riseborough, “W.E.”) and overseen via video link by the chilly, disembodied voice of commander Sally (Melissa Leo, playing a perky, Southern-twanged HAL).

In two weeks, Jack and Victoria’s mission will be over and they will go join the rest of mankind on their new home, Saturn moon Titan. But when a spacecraft comes crashing down to Earth and from its fiery wreckage emerges the mysterious woman who for years has haunted Jack’s dreams (Olga Kurylenko, “To the Wonder”), Jack is forced to question the reality with which he has been presented and, to his horror, comes to realise that all is not as it seems.

There’s plenty to like in “Oblivion:” the future-tech design is neat, the techno score from M83 surges with a pulsating energy, and the tumultuous love triangle shared between Cruise, Riseborough and Kurylenko provides a brief but appreciated human element that crucially was missing from “TRON: Legacy." Unfortunately, glacial pacing means that the film drags considerably in its lengthy, world-building set-up, the story first gaining momentum well over an hour into the overstretched 120-minute runtime — by the time Morgan Freeman turns up, chomping on a cigar in a thankless supporting role as a goggled, all-knowing resistance leader, boredom has settled in, and the high-octane action that follows doesn't quite compensate.

Plus, the film is shrouded in an thick fog of eerie familiarity, far too derivative of other, better sci-fi movies: constantly borrowed, recycled and outright thieved are elements from enduring classics such as “Brazil,” “Planet of the Apes,” “The Terminator” and “Aliens,” along with newer, superior genre entries such as “Wall-E," “A.I.: Artificial Intelligence" and “Moon" — even the grand, explosive finale is a clone of that of “Independence Day," if without the goofy sense of humour and the unashamed sense of fun. As always, Cruise makes for a breezily charming action-hero and wanders the ruined Earth with the same troubled look of wistful longing recently sported by Will Smith in Francis Lawrence’s last-man-on-Earth pic “I Am Legend.” But in the realm of high-concept sci-fi blockbusters starring Mr Cruise, this is hardly “Minority Report” — still, Kosinski gives it a good go, and the barren landscapes sure are pretty.

5/10

Evil Dead

It almost sounds like the premise for a horror movie: 34 years ago, in the winter of ‘79, a couple of college pals ventured deep into the dark woods of Morristown, Tennessee to make a low-budget splatter-shocker called “The Evil Dead.” The result, made with $90,000 and bathed in gallons of red karo syrup, was a cult classic of its genre: though its unwavering commitment to graphic grotesquery saw it initially branded by newspaper headlines as “obscene” and labelled in the UK as a “video nasty," writer-director Sam Raimi’s outrageous feature debut went on to become a roaring global success, topping the rental charts when released on video in 1983, transforming its star Bruce Campbell into a beloved cult icon, rightly hailed as a masterpiece of modern horror and going on to spawn two worthy, and increasingly comedic, sequels (1987’s “Evil Dead II” and 1993's “Army of Darkness”).

And, to complete the ritual with which Hollywood has recently bestowed the genre, now comes the inevitable remake, which flaunts the glossy visual flair and impossibly attractive leads that have come to represent the big-budget horror recycle. Yet it would be wrong to lump Uruguayan director Fede Alvarez’s lovingly crafted modern-day revival in with the vacuous, Michael Bay-produced, 21st century updates of “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre," “Friday the 13th" and “A Nightmare on Elm Street," or, god forbid, the infamously ham-handed “Wicker Man" hack-job featuring a gurning, career-torching Nicolas Cage. Given the stamp of approval by producers Raimi and Campbell, the “Evil Dead” of 2013 is an infinitely superior work to those dead-eyed imitations, springing with life and helmed by a director armed with a genuine care for the film he’s making and a heartfelt affection for the one he’s remaking.

The basic premise is unchanged: once again, a group of five doomed twentysomethings drive to a secluded cabin in the woods, and once again, demonic forces come out from the trees to ruin their vacation. There is, however, a neat twist this time round: heroin addict Mia (an excellent Jane Levy) vows upon arrival to put a stop her drug-taking, emptying her baggie of white powder into a nearby well and preparing herself for the familiar horrors of going cold turkey. This lends the group an intriguing dynamic once the evil is unleashed and Mia begins acting “strange,” but any sense of ambiguity as to her apparently fast-dwindling mental state — are these symptoms of withdrawal or signs of a possession? — is quickly thrown out the cabin window and left to die in the woods when an ominous warning from a crazed, shotgun-wielding Mia starts to be fulfilled: “You are all going to die tonight.”

Alvarez's reverence for Raimi's original is clear as he infuses his update with visual nods and winks — be it the camera gliding hurriedly through the woods in pursuit of our heroes, or the beady eyes of a “Deadite” staring out from under the chained-up cellar door — and daringly recreates iconic moments from the trilogy: the infamous tree-rape scene is given a legs-crossing, parasitic spin, while a scene of demon-ridding self-amputation evokes a similar life-saving act by trilogy hero Ash, if shown in more graphic detail and without the sly pay-off of a wickedly funny Ernest Hemingway gag. Of course, with unavoidable and nigh-unfair comparison, Raimi’s film always comes out on top, but it’s impressive how sturdily Alvarez’s version stands on its own two feet, thanks in part to his dauntless direction and the infectious verve with which he depicts the grisly carnage.

Speaking of which, the film is certainly not to be viewed by the squeamish: once that Candarian incantation from the Book of the Dead is ill-advisedly read aloud, nary a minute goes by where the screen isn’t dripping with blood and guts and piss and vomit. To say that the film is gory is to say that the Atlantic Ocean is watery: indeed, so bloody is it that at one point in the nail-biting (and hand-lopping) climax, bucket-loads of blood literally pour from the night sky, a gloriously gruesome and utterly surreal sight shockingly topped moments later with the swing of a chainsaw — never before has the decimation of a human skull wielded such lurid beauty.

However, in amongst all the gratuitous mayhem, an error is made: screenwriters Alvarez, Rodo Sayagues and Diablo Cody (“Juno”) aim for both straight-faced sentimentality and sadistic glee in the same breath, a trick Raimi’s original pulled off thanks to a (reportedly unintentional) campiness that Alvarez's version, scared of being cheesy, deliberately avoids (“We can’t bury Shelly, s-she’s a friend of ours!” shrieked Ashley J. Williams in 1981, and oh how we laughed). Plus, for a film that boldly purports in its poster to be “the most terrifying film you will ever experience,” it comes up curiously short in the frights department: the scariest it gets is in its multitude of jump scares, while its moments of pulse-pounding suspense are, save for the 10-minute finale, all too brief, faltering in comparison with the overwhelming intensity of Raimi’s original.

Still, “Evil Dead” marks a mightily impressive debut from Alvarez, whose first film is an eye-popping technical marvel that champions old-school effects and which can pride itself as one of the finest horror remakes of recent years. Leave your skepticism at the cabin door, folks: “Evil Dead” is a rollicking, blood-splattered roller-coaster ride. Oh, and make sure you sit through the credits: there’s a stinger at the end guaranteed to put a grin on any fan’s face.

7/10

Trance

In the brain-bending, high-concept psycho-thriller “Trance,” director Danny Boyle takes us on a ride into the shattered mind and misplaced memories of an amnesiac art aficionado in search of a missing multimillion-pound painting. The painting is Francisco Goya’s late 18th century masterpiece “Witches in the Air,” and in an electrifying 20-minute opening — as slickly photographed by Anthony Dod Mantle and given pulse-pounding energy by composer Rick Smith — it is stolen from a London auction house by a gang of gun-toting crooks. Or at least that was the plan: when head honcho Franck (Vincent Cassel, “Black Swan") unzips the black briefcase supposed to contain his £25 million prize, he finds in his hands an empty frame.

Suspicion falls on the inside man, sharp-suited auctioneer Simon (James McAvoy, “Welcome to the Punch”), who swears while his fingernails are worked on with a Stanley knife that he has no memory of where he stashed the canvas prior to the handover. His excuse seems feasible: he was, after all, given a near-fatal bonk on the head during the final moments of the heist and, when taken to hospital, had a hole drilled deep into his skull. Things get trickier — and weirder — when Simon is taken to see Dr Elizabeth Lamb (Rosario Dawson, “Sin City”), a high-street hypnotherapist who agrees to trawl through Simon’s mind and extract the painting’s location in exchange for a cut of the loot. But when Simon is put under and his subconscious is rooted around in, the situation proves more complicated than previously thought, this gripping crime caper swiftly transforming into a head-spinning, brain-scrambling mystery where the line separating fantasy from reality becomes a deceptive blur.

It is a concept that naturally and dangerously evokes Christopher Nolan’s dream-hopping 2010 blockbuster “Inception” and Michel Gondry’s memory-wiping 2004 indie romance “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,” but “Trance” is  more twisted than both of those science fiction masterworks, traveling down unexpected paths where the darkest of secrets are unearthed. Screenwriters Joe Ahearne and John Hodge, adapting from Ahearne’s little-seen 2001 TV movie of the same name, revel in unravelling the plot’s countless twists and turns, while Boyle is clearly having a ball as he infuses the film with the same spunk and energy we’ve come to expect from him since his morbidly comic feature debut, 1994’s “Shallow Grave.”

Speaking of which, “Trance” has at its centre a similarly tumultuous character dynamic to that mid-90s Brit hit: once again we have a trio of self-centred, money-grubbing back-stabbers, none of whom we trust, nor particularly like. Though he is our narrator, the mentally damaged and double-crossing Simon is a wholly unreliable one, just like the increasingly psychotic, power-drilling attic-dweller played by Christopher Eccleston. Cassel, in typically seedy — but smoothly charismatic — badguy mode, at first glance appears to be the most straightforward of the three, but upon closer inspection we begin to wonder if this sadistic gangster is so repulsive after all. But the standout of the three is Dawson, who oozes raw sex appeal as the seductive and manipulative femme fatale of this knotty neo-noir whom we sense from the get-go knows more than she’s letting on; like her two male co-stars, and indeed the film itself, Dr Elizabeth Lamb is a beguiling figure shrouded in intriguing mysteries.

This is the first film Boyle has manned since his triumphant opening ceremony to the 2012 Olympics turned a whole nation’s frown upside down. Those seeking out the film based solely on his newfound national treasure status are in for a shock, what with the film’s garish explosions of sex, violence and full-frontal nudity, as well as, in one rather alarming fantasy scene, the sight of a character having the top half of his head blown off, picking himself up and then continuing to speak. If there’s anything to be said against the film, it would be that it is perhaps a little hollow and that the story, with its mounting revelations, is a little convoluted. But like the greatest of cinema’s directors, Boyle keeps us hypnotised at every turn, eager to see how the puzzle pieces will fit together — even at the end, when the puzzle is complete, we’re still not sure what it is we’re looking at.

8/10

Compliance

When it premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January of 2012, “Compliance” caused quite the stir: those who hadn’t already walked out of the screening stayed to boo at the screen as the curtains were drawn, and when writer-director Craig Zobel took to the stage for the post-film Q&A session, he was met with furious outcries and accusations of misogyny. Now that it’s arrived in UK theatres, it’s easy to see why festival-goers kicked up such a fuss: this low-key, fact-based suspense thriller is a uniquely disquieting, squirm-inducing 90-minute trip into the deepest, darkest pits of human nature, where audiences are invited to become voyeurs to the degradation and exploitation of an innocent 19-year-old girl when a prank phone call spirals dangerously out of control.

This victimised teen is Becky, a small-town counter girl at an understaffed fast food joint played by the notably attractive Dreama Walker (“Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23”). Her manager is the middle-aged, overworked Sandra (Ann Dowd, “Side Effects”), who, on the restaurant’s busiest day of the week, receives a phone call from a man who identifies himself as Police Officer Daniels (Pat Healy, “The Innkeepers”). He needs Sandra’s help: it seems a pretty young blonde among her staff, whom Sandra guesses to be Becky (“Ah yes, Rebecca!” recalls the caller), has been accused of stealing money from a customer, and it is up to Sandra to detain the suspect until a squad car can arrive on the scene. Eager to cooperate, Sandra escorts Becky into the storage room, where Becky stubbornly protests her innocence and where “Officer Daniels” has a few tasks for the pair to perform for him.

What unfolds in that room is several harrowing hours of humiliation and violation, as conducted by the disembodied voice of a phoney policeman: using fine-tuned tactics of persuasion and manipulation, “Officer Daniels” slowly but surely coerces Sandra into stripping Becky from head to toe and subjecting her to an all manner of emotional, psychological and eventually physical abuse, all while oblivious customers eat in peace at the tables outside. What’s most remarkable about the film is not that it’s based on a true story — it’s that it’s based on over 70 true stories. From 1992 through to 2004, similar incidents were reported across 30 US states, as fast food chains were targeted by a sadistic prank caller who convinced staff members to conduct strip searches, and sometimes more than that, on unsuspecting female employees.

“Compliance” most closely resembles one specific case in 2004 where events escalated further into depravity than they ever had before, and in recreating that devastating night, Zobel presents us with a fascinating, if flawed insight into how human beings respond to the illusion of authority — almost immediately, “Officer Daniels” demands that he be called “sir,” and almost immediately, Sandra falls in line, willing to betray her most basic moral values in the name of following the officer’s every order, no matter how sleazy, nor indeed how criminal. Called into question is whether or not Sandra herself is a victim in all of this (she is, after all, cruelly manipulated), but one could argue that she’s not the one left to quiver and weep in the corner while wearing nothing but an all-too-revealing apron.

I say the film’s insight is flawed because although Walker and Dowd succeed in creating believable characters — the sort we might recognise from our own lives — the actions they commit and the situation in which they find themselves are inherently unbelievable. That such implausible events truly did occur in the spring of ‘04 doesn't let the film off the hook, as it fails to supply a sufficient reason as to why no one at any point ever thinks to question the caller's true identity. This is particularly jarring when Sandra’s fiancé enters the equation, is handed the phone and as the film launches, in its most shocking scenes, into full-on sexual assault — this leaves us to wonder, as one baffled lawman later remarks, just what exactly was in these people’s chicken. Still, this is a gripping film, Zobel ratcheting up the tension to near-unbearable levels and presenting a deeply penetrating experience that will not be easily forgotten — “Compliance” is a film that crawls its way under your skin and refuses to leave.

7/10

Identity Thief

In the Judd Apatow-produced, Paul Feig-directed 2011 comedy juggernaut “Bridesmaids,” supporting star Melissa McCarthy was a side-splitting force to be reckoned with: stealing the show from leading lady Kristen Wiig — partly down to her bullish, boisterous charm, partly down to the startling sight of her explosively defecating into a bathroom sink — the former “Gilmore Girls” regular and long-time bit-player was suddenly thrust into the public consciousness, transformed into a household name, showered in global critical acclaim and rightly nominated for an Academy Award. And if she has any wishes to continue this hard-earned, long-overdue success, “Identity Thief” is surely a calamitous misstep.

This poisonously undercooked studio product, in which McCarthy shares top billing with co-star Jason Bateman (“The Change-Up”), claims in its TV spot to be “the year’s first great comedy" — looks like it’s taken its title a bit literally. It comes from the director of “Horrible Bosses,” a darkly comic — though broadly played — murder-scheme farce with a cracking cast and an inspired concept. The concept here — a rowdy scam artist and her latest hapless victim embark on a disastrous road trip together — has equally ripe comic potential, but the barely half-hearted execution falls a hundred miles-or-so too short, Craig Mazin’s (“The Hangover Part II”) woefully witless screenplay leaving any hope of a giggle or two to wither and die by the side of the road.

Still, McCarthy — sticking to her lovable wild-gal persona — does good with rotten material as Diana, a rambunctious crook living the high life in sunny Miami thanks to the unwitting help of Sandy Patterson (Bateman), a mild-mannered pencil-pusher from Denver whose identity Diana has craftily stolen. Sandy, finding his bank account drained and the justice system bafflingly unable to help, decides to travel to Florida himself to personally arrest Diana, bring her back to Colorado with him and dupe her into confessing her crimes. Diana, told that all she has to do is clear Sandy’s name, reluctantly agrees, but the 1500-mile ride proves less than smooth — pursuing the pair is a psychopathic bounty hunter and a couple of hired guns, whose presence is pointless and needlessly convolutes the plot.

It is on this ride that “Identity Thief” slavishly ticks every box in the Road Movie handbook — here we have a mismatched pairing, motel shenanigans, run-ins with the law, broken-down vehicles, a woodland attack by a wild animal and of course that old classic: a character obnoxiously singing along to the radio. The only thing that’s missing is the laughter as the plot plods along with depressing predictability, leaving one to yearn for the knee-slapping brilliance of superior road comedies “Midnight Run” and “Planes, Trains and Automobiles,” or hell, even “Dumb and Dumber.”

McCarthy and Bateman do share a certain odd-couple chemistry as they bicker and bond on the open road, and they are admirably committed to their roles, even when the film misguidedly wallows in unearned, teary-eyed sentimentality — movie, you’ve yet to make me laugh; don’t turn around and try to make me cry. But the film struggles to wring so much as a titter out of their frequent interplay, often leaving them stranded in the middle of nowhere and having to survive solely on their comic dynamic — for 110 minutes, that’s not enough to keep our attention. I think I might have half-smiled once, 30 minutes in, when Bateman bashes McCarthy in the face with an acoustic guitar. That’s about as inspired as the gags get, and it’s a gag that is of course given away in the trailer. McCarthy will next be seen in Paul Feig’s buddy cop comedy “The Heat” alongside Sandra Bullock. Let’s hope that does her more justice than this joyless dreck.

3/10