Susan Granger’s review of “ART OF WAR” (Warner Bros.)
Talk about synchronous ideas: the same week that psychologist Richard Hatch became ultimate “Survivor,” “Art of War” celebrates the concept of manipulation and control. It’s all about using strategy to understand your opponent and defeat him. The idea of “Art of War” is based on an ancient handbook by Sun Tsu, a powerful Asian general who believed that wars can be won without ever having to actually fight. Many great generals, including Napoleon, used Sun Tsu’s philosophy, and its tenets are as applicable to business, politics and winning TV game shows as they are to war. In the international suspense thriller, Wesley Snipes plays a covert American agent, a “fixer,” who gets involved in the emerging trade relations between China and the Western world as a group of murdered Chinese refugees is found in a container in the New York harbor and the Chinese U.N. Ambassador is assassinated in the midst of delivering a speech. Because he was in the wrong place at the right time, Snipes is accused and the only witness who can prove his innocence is a Chinese translator (Marie Matiko). Meanwhile, Donald Sutherland is the U.N. Secretary General, a Canadian, with Anne Archer as his iron-fisted chief of security. Maury Chaykin is a senior FBI agent with his own agenda, while Michael Biehn is Snipes’ partner. And Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa is a successful entrepreneur, an Eastern cowboy straddling two cultures. Director Christian Duguay relishes the gratuitous, realistic violence of Wayne Beach and Simon Davis Barry’s script, but it’s Snipes’ hip, cool charisma that ties the enigmatic story together, On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Art of War” is a slick, synchronous 7, the final summer popcorn picture. “It’s the game that makes us tick” – and Wesley Snipes is the winner here
