Alex Cross (film)

Alex Cross
Directed by	Rob Cohen
Screenplay by	Marc Moss Kerry Williamson
Produced by	Bill Block Steve Bowen Randal Emmett Leopoldo Gout Paul Hanson James Patterson
Starring	Tyler Perry Matthew Fox
Cinematography	Ricardo Della Rosa
Edited by	Matt Diezel Thom Noble
Music by	John Debney
Production companies	QED International Block/Hanson Emmett/Furla Films Envision Entertainment Corporation IAC Productions James Patterson Entertainment
Distributed by	Summit Entertainment
Release date	October 19, 2012 (2012-10-19)
Running time	101 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$35 million
Box office	$25,426,275

Alex Cross is a 2012 American crime thriller film starring Tyler Perry as the titular character and Matthew Fox as the villain. The film is directed by Rob Cohen based on an adapted screenplay by Marc Moss and Kerry Williamson. This is the third film appearance of the character Alex Cross, the main character of a series of novels by James Patterson. Cross was previously portrayed by Morgan Freeman in Kiss the Girls (1997) and Along Came a Spider (2001). In 2010, Idris Elba was attached to star, but he was replaced by Perry. Filming took place in 2011. The film was released on October 19, 2012 in the United States and Canada.

Plot

Dr. Alex Cross (Tyler Perry) is a psychologist and police lieutenant who lives in the Indian village neighborhood of Detroit with his wife, Maria (Carmen Ejogo), their children, Damon and Janelle, and his grandmother, Nana Mama. Upon learning that Maria is pregnant with their third child, Cross considers accepting a job as an FBI profiler, but fears Maria's reaction, as it would require them to relocate to Washington, D.C. Meanwhile, a man called Picasso (Matthew Fox) participates in an underground mixed martial arts match, where he flirts with businesswoman Fan Yau (Stephanie Jacobsen). After brutally beating his opponent, Picasso is invited to Fan Yau's house in Grosse Pointe. There, he sedates, tortures, and kills her.

Police captain Richard Brookwell (John C. McGinley) calls Cross and his partner, Tommy Kane (Edward Burns), to the crime scene. On the way there, Cross tells Kane about Maria's pregnancy and the FBI's offer, and Kane reveals that he is secretly dating their colleague, Monica Ashe (Rachel Nichols). Investigating Yau's murder, Cross deduces that Picasso is a professional assassin, and finds a sketch left behind by Picasso revealing that his next target is a German businessman, Erich Nunemarcher (Werner Daehn). Cross, Kane and Ashe go to Nunemarcher's office, but he dismisses their claims. Picasso manages to enter the building, but is prevented from killing Nunemarcher by Cross, and escapes after being shot by Kane.

Analyzing a drop of Picasso's blood, Cross learns that Picasso is a psychotic former member of the Special Forces and that his real target is billionaire CEO Leon Mercier (Jean Reno). Cross informs Mercier that Picasso might be trying to kill him. Meanwhile, as revenge for their earlier interference, Picasso attacks Ashe, sedating, torturing and killing her; and murders Maria with a sniper shot, leading both Cross and Kane to swear revenge against him. The detectives learn that Picasso is targeting Mercier at a conference and informs Brookwell, who isolates the area. However, Picasso is able to kill Mercier by firing a bazooka from a moving train. Cross and Kane chase after Picasso and corner him at an abandoned theater. Kane is injured in the car accident, Cross chases Picasso and Picasso hits him with a pipe, after that Picasso and Cross fight with Picasso pinning Cross, Picasso tells him he is going to, then kicks him in his side, enjoy this, which means he is going to enjoy killing Cross, he takes out a syringe and attempts to paralyze Cross, but Cross pulls out a little pocket knife from Picasso's back and stabs him in the shoulder with it, this causes them to fall through the thing, Cross is holding on to a wire for dear life and Picasso is hanging on his leg, Picasso looks at Cross and says his final words to him "I made you! Cross then kicks him in his face while yelling "DIE!" Picasso then yells as he finds on to a car, finally killing him.

Cross eventually learns that Picasso's employer was Mercier himself. Having embezzled money from his clients, Mercier asked for Yau and Nunemarcher's help to fake his death and flee to Bali, and then hired Picasso to eliminate Yau, Nunemarcher and a double pretending to be the real Mercier. However, Cross is able to plant drugs in Mercier's belongings before he leaves and informs the local police. Mercier is arrested in Indonesia and condemned to death by firing squad. Cross tells him that his wife is dead because of PicassoHaving avenged Maria's murder, Cross decides to accept the FBI's offer and move to Washington with his family. Before he leaves, Kane reveals that he also applied for a job in the FBI. After expressing his hope that he and Cross will work together again one day, they part ways.

Cast

• Tyler Perry as Dr. Alex Cross
• Matthew Fox as Picasso
• Edward Burns as Tommy Kane
• Rachel Nichols as Monica Ashe
• Cicely Tyson as Nana Mama
• Carmen Ejogo as Maria Cross
• Giancarlo Esposito as Daramus Holiday
• John C. McGinley as Richard Brookwell
• Jean Reno as Leon Mercier
• Ingo Rademacher as Officer Sacks

Production

Alex Cross is directed by Rob Cohen based on an adapted screenplay by Marc Moss and Kerry Williamson. The film stars Alex Cross, the protagonist in a series of novels written by James Patterson. Cross was previously portrayed by Morgan Freeman in Kiss the Girls (1997) and Along Came a Spider (2001). The character was rebooted in 2010 when a project began development with a screenplay by Williamson and Patterson. David Twohy was attached as director with the responsibility of rewriting the screenplay. In August 2010, Idris Elba was cast as Alex Cross.

Toward the end of 2010, QED International purchased rights and the initial screenplay by Williamson and Patterson. By January 2011, Tyler Perry replaced Elba in the starring role, and Cohen was attached as director. QED hired Marc Moss, who worked on the previous Alex Cross films, to refine the screenplay for Perry and Cohen. With a production budget of $35 million, filming began on August 8, 2011 in Cleveland, Ohio and lasted until September 16, 2011. Filming locations in northeast Ohio served as a backdrop to Detroit, Michigan, where the character works for the Detroit Police Department. After Ohio, filming also took place in Detroit itself for two weeks.

Fox developed an extremely muscular physique for his role as Picasso and lost most of his body fat.

Release

Alex Cross was released in the United States and Canada on October 19, 2012. Summit Entertainment purchased distribution rights for the territories in March 2011. The distributor originally set the release date for October 26, 2012.

The theatrical release poster featured the tagline, "Don't ever cross Alex Cross." The Playlist at indieWire was critical of the tagline, saying, "It'll be impressive if anything dumber appears on a movie poster this year."

Reception

The film has received mainly negative reviews from critics. It holds a 13% "rotten" rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 111 reviews with the consensus stating: "Tyler Perry and Matthew Fox do their best, but they're trampled by Rob Cohen's frustrating direction and a tasteless, lazily written screenplay." At Metacritic, it received a weighted average score of 30%, based on reviews from 34 critics.

Despite the generally negative response, reviewers praised Tyler Perry for his unexpected performance, in a role different from his previous work.

Sequel

Prior to the film's release, it was announced that Double Cross would be adapted into a film with Perry reprising his role.

External links

• Alex Cross at IMDb
• Alex Cross at AllMovie