Out of Control (2009)

This is a tender, generous movie that likes its characters and presents them as real people, full of flaws and strengths.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

This is the usual suspense movie, good enough to hold your attention but nothing you'll be talking to your friends about afterward. Ms. Vandervoort does a fair job in this, as do the others, and it held my interest well enough. I've never felt much sympathy for stunningly beautiful women, not being one myself; I figured their beauty compensated for whatever prejudices they faced. Reading the venomous comments regarding Ms. Vandervoort, though, gave me an insight into the malice some people direct their way. This movie is not destined to be a classic studied in film classes, true, but the actors and actresses in it do an average to slightly above-average job.

Boy this thing had the stamp of Lifetime all over it. Released in 2009 and produced in Canada, Out of Control stars Laura Vandervoort, an absolutely stunning blonde. She plays Marcie, who is a Chicago cop longing to be a detective. She gets her chance, against the wishes of her retired officer father.In real life, Vandervoort has a second degree black belt in karate. I have a feeling in her case it was necessary.I actually can't describe the acting in this because I didn't see any. The pacing is terrible, and the characters are vapid and not very likable. They all have attitude for days. Then there's the script.And it's badly miscast. I'm not saying beautiful women don't become policewomen, of course they do. But I wouldn't describe Laura Vandervoort as simply beautiful. We're talking Miss Universe or supermodel here. Someone like this, if she wanted to be involved in law enforcement, would be doing something that required her to go undercover exposing drug lords, corruption in high finance, doing FBI stings. Certainly she'd be too valuable for a job investigating murder on the Chicago police force.Annoying rather than entertaining.

Actually, after the first 10 minutes of this, I was expecting another Canadian thrown-together piece of trash. In fact, I skipped ahead to the credits to verify the usual suspects (The Movie Network, MovieCentral, Canadian Film or Video Tax Credit, etc.). But I like to finish what I start, so I went back and watched it through.To say I was "pleasantly" surprised probably isn't the right terminology. The movie is bad. It really should have been an episode in some TV series, at best, rather than eating up valuable movie time. But it wasn't the trip to the dentist that I was expecting. It keeps up a decent pace (mostly) and has an identifiable plot. The city obviously isn't Chicago, but it at least isn't obviously any other place either (unless you happen to live where it was shot). It's not Serpico, but it's OK, as another person wrote, to do laundry to.In contrast to the other comment-writers, I have to say that Vandervoort's casting was the only good choice. All the others are clearly way out of their element (that is, in front of a camera) and not remotely believable in their roles (although some of this is due to the dreadful script, but good actors avoid such roles, so ultimately it is their fault). At least Vandervoort demonstrated the confidence that you'd expect in someone working for law enforcement, if nothing else. I doubt any of these characters (any of them) would last a day in the real job.

Typical LMN empty plot trite with typical bleached blond in the lead. I was rooting for the villains in this one for certainly Laura Vandervoot in the lead was more of a bitch than any one else. Always with a nose in the air attitude and going around looking out of place in the police station. She annoyed me very much as she stepped on all in her way. I had wished someone would have done her in. No such luck. We're forced to look at this bimbo for two hours attempting to unravel the plot walking over all in her way. Some broad, eh? Even her own father, she smart mouths. By the way he gave one of the better acting jobs. Francis X. McCarthy didn't have much to do, but the little he did do, was fine. Amy Sloan also did a great job in an unrewarding role. I wanted her to bash in the leading lady's head when she gave her so much crap. There is nothing rewarding about this mess. Oh, yes, Chris Kramer plays the man in the film and he does a decent job. I felt sorry for them all to have to play opposite such a loser. Her so called karate moves in the end are so laughable, I split my sides. She's such a bad actress and unbelievable from beginning to end. Frightening to think this blond bimbo will be on the police force. Egads!