Bird on a Wire

Directed by John Badham, Bird on a Wire follows Mel Gibson’s Rick Jarmin and Goldie Hawn’s Marianne Graves as they’re forced to go on the run after Rick’s past catches up with him. Filmmaker Badham, armed with Louis Venosta, Eric Lerner, and David Seltzer’s screenplay, delivers a progressively hit-and-miss comedy that fares best within its briskly-paced and often genuinely exciting first half, and there’s little doubt, certainly, that the picture benefits substantially from the predictably winning efforts of its two charismatic stars – with Gibson and Hawn’s perpetually entertaining work heightened by their palpable chemistry with one another. It’s clear, too, that Bird on a Wire‘s early success is due in no small part to Badham’s top-notch handling of its various action-forward sequences, as the movie boasts a series of engaging chase sequences, including both car and helicopter pursuit interludes, that perpetuate its compulsively watchable atmosphere. There’s little doubt, then, that the movie’s overall impact is seriously (and severely) hampered by an underwhelming, interminable zoo-set climax, with the far-from-satisfying bent of this overlong stretch ensuring that the whole thing concludes on as lackluster a note as one could possibly envision. Still, Bird on a Wire, up until that point, comes off as an agreeable ’90s actioner that contains, at its core, first-class performances from two leads at the top of their respective games.

**1/2 out of ****