Point Break | Film review - Bigger isn't better for extreme sports thriller remake | Movie Talk | What's on TV

(Image credit: Courtesy of Warner Bros. Picture)

Back in 1991 Keanu Reeve’s rookie FBI agent went undercover to infiltrate bank-robbing surfer Patrick Swayze’s gang in Kathryn Bigelow’s breathless, bonkers thriller " target="_self">Point Break.

The plot remains nonsense on stilts in cinematographer-turned-director Ericson Core’s glossy remake, but new stars Luke Bracey and Edgar Ramirez can claim only a fraction of their predecessors’ chemistry and charisma. Indeed, Bracey’s emotionally scarred Johnny Utah is so wooden he makes Keanu look like Kenneth Branagh, although Ramirez makes a better fist of the nirvana-seeking Bodhi.

The new Point Break tries to raise the stakes by turning its antagonists into extreme sports athletes and justifying their wave riding, sky diving, free climbing exploits with even larger doses of woolly New Age philosophising than the original. But bigger doesn’t turn out to be better. And with little emotional investment in the characters the overly slick action - largely shot at a distance to obscure the stuntmen’s identities – proves surprisingly boring.

Certificate 12A. Runtime 114 mins. Director Ericson Core

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XgJPqEnXPV8

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A film critic for over 25 years, Jason admits the job can occasionally be glamorous – sitting on a film festival jury in Portugal; hanging out with Baz Luhrmann at the Chateau Marmont; chatting with Sigourney Weaver about The Archers – but he mostly spends his time in darkened rooms watching films. He’s also written theatre and opera reviews, two guide books on Rome, and competed in a race for Yachting World, whose great wheeze it was to send a seasick film critic to write about his time on the ocean waves. But Jason is happiest on dry land with a classic screwball comedy or Hitchcock thriller.