Thrill-less 'Man on a Ledge' should've jumped

Nothing in Asger Leth's alleged crime thriller "Man on a Ledge" is thrilling. But, man, it's criminal.

The movie bludgeons us with blunt instruments called dialogue. ("Time is running out for the man on the ledge!" Kyra Sedgwick's TV news reporter screeches.)

It assaults us with thinly conceived stock characters who only exist to propel the ker-thudding plot, a simplistically dopey heist scenario that cheats and misleads us so we won't catch on to a "surprise" near the end.

Then there's Sam Worthington's supposed born-and-bred New York cop who breaks into a harried Australian accent every time he gets excited and shouts at Elizabeth Banks' police negotiator.

Good on ya, Sam.

A disclaimer: I arrived tardy for the press screening for "Man on a Ledge" and feared that I would have to see the movie a second time to understand what I missed.

Fortunately for me and unfortunately for the movie, that proved to be an unnecessary concern.

The repetitive screenplay has been so dumbed-down that it took mere minutes to catch on that Worthington's Nick Cassidy is a New York cop falsely imprisoned for stealing the spectacular Monarch Diamond from building tycoon and general sleazebag David Englander (Ed Harris with corruption and graft dripping from his words).

Nick, after escaping from the guards, has taken a room at New York's Roosevelt Hotel. Then he climbs out on the ledge where people on the street soon spot him and presume he intends to jump.

The production team behind "Man on a Ledge" specified that Nick should go out on a ledge between 18 and 22 floors up so that he could see the faces of the onlookers as they plead for him to go back in, or - as most do - energetically encourage him to make a mess on the sidewalk.

The movie squanders a grand opportunity to explore the inhumanity of regular bloodthirsty New Yorkers.

Pablo Fenjves' screenplay isn't interested in the complexities of human behavior. Just a ridiculously simple heist for a good cause.

While Nick attracts major attention from the media and the cops, his squirrel-like little brother Joey (Jamie Bell) and Joey's Victoria Secret underwear-loving girlfriend Angie (Genesis Rodriguez) bypass Englander's state-of-the-art security systems to break into his vault where they hope to find the Monarch Diamond that Nick supposedly stole.

At the Roosevelt Hotel, cop negotiator Lydia Mercer (Banks, valiantly attempting to imbue her character with empathy and sincerity) uses her bag of tricks to win Nick's trust and save his life.

But she's not sure of herself ever since her last client died. She uses Nick to get back in the negotiating saddle. Nick doesn't exactly cooperate.

"How far would you go to get back at the man who took everything from you?" Nick thunders. Yes, he really talks like a narrator from a "Man on a Ledge" trailer.

Lydia isn't the most perceptive cop on the beat. She fails to notice the communications device in Nick's left ear that he uses to talk his comic-relief brother Joey through various safecracking problems.

Joey's girlfriend Angie hardly qualifies to be Tom Cruise's teammate from a "Mission: Impossible" caper. She's mostly used for eye candy when she doffs overalls before she shimmies through an air shaft.

At least something in "Man on a Ledge" is stripped down to its essentials.

“Man on a Ledge”

★

Starring: Sam Worthington, Jamie Bell, Elizabeth Banks, Ed Harris

Directed by: Asger Leth

Other: A Summit Films release. Rated PG-13 for violence and language. 102 minutes