Director Report Card: Tony Scott (2006)

14. Déjà Vu

It would seem Tony Scott and Jerry Bruckheimer's careers were irrevocably intertwined, no matter how much they hated working together sometimes. After a long break, following "Crimson Tide," the two would work together again with "Déjà Vu." The film was co-written by Terry Rossio, who had just authored the mega-successful "Pirates of the Caribbean" for Bruckheimer. Obviously feeling like they had a good thing going, Scott would also reteam with Denzel Washington for the third time. The film would be released in 2006. 

In New Orleans, on Fat Tuesday, a ferry is destroyed by a home-made bomb. Over five hundred people are killed. ATF agent Douglas Carlin, gifted at quickly spotting evidence, is brought in to investigate. He discovers a dead woman, Claire Kuchever, in the river, with wounds that suggest she was burned before the explosion. Carlin is recruited by an FBI agent to join a new government investigation unit. He's presented with a machine that can perfectly recreate visions of the past, from four days ago and within a specific range. Carlin quickly deduces the machine is a form of time travel. As he uses the machine to dig into the explosion, uncovering the domestic terrorist responsible, he grows increasingly attached to Claire. Soon, he tries going back in time himself to stop the bombing.  

"Déjà Vu" is based around an irresistible premise that has driven time travel stories for decades: Can you really change the past? At first, the "Snow White" machine is depicted as only being able to look into the past, itself an intoxicating idea. Slowly, Carlin begins to wonder if the machine can be used to send warnings back to the past. Debate arises over how this would affect things. Whether this would create a branching timeline or if the universe would reorder itself to "correct" these changes. If these attempts would be devastating. These are good questions to ask about such a premise and the foundation for a solid time travel story. The film comes to a conclusion about the ramifications of time travel eventually but it is fun that it even considers these possiblities. 

At first, "Déjà Vu" seems to be going with the second theory. That history is entirely unchangable and that any attempt to do so will result in events somehow still working out the same way. The movie presents events early in its story that it later returns to. A coworker of Carlin's disappears, is assumed to have died in the bombing, and is then discovered to have been killed by the villain after Carlin sends a warning back. Little bits of evidence presented early on – a phone number written on a candy wrapper, a hurried phone call, fingerprints on a glass of water – are registered later. While I don't know if everything lines up exactly, I did enjoy the way audience members paying attention were rewarded for noticing these earlier details.

The love story in "Déjà Vu" is also somewhat interesting. From the moment Carlin sees Claire in the morgue, he's struck by her beauty. As he peers into the past, he increasingly focuses on her day-to-day life. He becomes invested in this woman that was dead before he met her. He ultimately goes back in time precisely because he wants to save her. This set-up has a lot of morbid – falling in love with a corpse? – or creepy implications, since Carlin is basically spying on Claire's past all throughout the movie. The deeper themes of a guy becoming infatuated with a girl he doesn't even know are not explored. When Carlin and Claire do meet, she's quickly charmed by him. Yet this is, if nothing else, a novel spin on the standard genre movie romantic subplot. 

In fact, Claire quickly falling for Carlin after meeting him – even allowing him to kiss her – in the past, despite all the weirdness surrounding that, is why "Déjà Vu's" has a somewhat underwhelming last act. It turns out that this movie is more compelling as a mystery than as a thriller. Watching Carlin and his team dig into the available evidence to uncover the man responsible for this heinous act sucks you in, the way good mysteries do. Once Carlin goes back in time, "Déjà Vu" becomes a standard action flick about the good guy stopping the bad guy before it's too late. Once we get to the climatic showdown between the hero and the villain, the film has run out of ways to surprise the audience.

One thing I really liked about "Déjà Vu" is that it looks like a normal movie. Tony Scott is no longer employing the brain-frying visual techniques he used in "Man on Fire" and "Domino." This movie still looks more like "Bad Boys" than "The Hunger." Scott has long since left the sunset shots and billowing curtains in the last. The photography is a bit on the grainy side and the sun-washed visuals prevalent in Scott's last two movies remain here. There's one or two snap zooms. Yet there are no disorienting montages, visual/audio distortion, obnoxious on-screen text, or other overly self-indulgent style tics. You can watch "Déjà Vu" without getting a headache and I am thankful for that. 

The film's screenwriters were critical of "Déjà Vu," saying they had written a smart sci-fi movie and that Tony Scott made a typical action movie. Yes, the director does find ways to insert some elaborate action sequences into this story. The opening explosion on the ferry is shot like a typical Tony Scott fireball, which is maybe not the best choice for what is an act of horrible terrorism. The finale features a car shooting up into the air, spinning several times, and crashing into the water. Midway through the film, Denzel grabs a special rig that can extends the Snow White machine's range and hits the road with it. An elaborate car chase of sorts follows, with Denzel in a Jeep weaving in and out of traffic. There's some fancy car wrecks in this scene, which maybe are out-of-place but they do look cool. It is an exciting sequence. 

As a Denzel Washington movie, "Déjà Vu" does not offer the dramatic opportunities that "Man on Fire" or "Crimson Tide" did. Carlin is not an especially complex or conflicted guy. He's mostly a good detective, who wants to catch the person responsible for this crime, prevent it from happening, and save the girl. Pretty standard hero shit. Denzel even gets to play action hero again, during the shoot-out at the movie's ending. Yet Washington is never less than compelling in anything. The quiet delight Carlin takes in uncovering clues is a nice touch. You have no problem following this guy, even if he's not an especially deep or nuanced character. 

The villain in the film, eventually revealed to have the hilarious name of "Carroll Oerstadt," is played Jim Caviezel. Oerstadt is a hyper-nationalistic would-be "patriot" who is blowing up this boat as revenge against the U.S. after being rejected by the armed forces. He's covered in America-themed tattoos and it's implied his opinions of non-white people are not nice. The film's writers patterned the character after Timothy McVeigh, which goes to show you how the more things change, the more they stay the same. Because both Oerstadt and his crime seem very familiar in 2021, where we can't go more than a week without a right-winged prick or a radicalized incel killing a bunch of innocent people. Caviezel is very creepy in the part, presumably because the character is just a more extreme version of things he already believes.

Paula Patton plays Claire. While it seems likely that Patton was cast largely because, yes, she does have the kind of face a man could fall in love with at first sight, she's more than capable. Patton has an easy-going screen presence that make her early scenes likable. She handles herself during the action theatrics of the last act. Val Kilmer shows up at the FBI agent who recruits Carlin. It's cool to see Scott working with Kilmer again, after twenty years. He's totally serviceable in the party sharing a couple of good moments with Denzel. Adam Goldberg, as the smart-ass scientist working on Snow White, steals many of his scenes. His acerbic delivery help enlivens a character that otherwise doesn't do much beside deliver exposition. 

"Déjà Vu" was also, notably, one of the first productions to film in Louisiana after Hurricane Katrina. The disaster is mentioned by name and its lingering shadow hangs over many of the movie's scenes. Yet "Déjà Vu" is here to celebrate New Orleans, not bury it. The elevated cemeteries and jazz culture of the city adds a lot of color and energy to "Déjà Vu." I'm sure this isn't the state's proudest cinematic moment nor its best on-screen depiction. There's still a clear affection for the community and its culture in the movie. When "Déjà Vu" ends with a dedication to the people of New Orleans, it feels very sincere. 

"Déjà Vu" did pretty well at the box office, making 180 million worldwide against a 75 million dollar production budget. Reviews were mixed, with some finding the movie preposterous while others were able to enjoy its mixture of sci-fi ideas and big action set pieces. While the screenwriters of a movie criticizing the final film isn't unprecedented, Tony Scott also said he made some mistakes while making the film. "Déjà Vu" is certainly not a masterpiece but it is reasonably entertaining while you're watching it. I enjoy time travel stories and this one found a pretty fun spin on the idea. [Grade: B]