Chev Chelios (Jason Statham) is a real bad guy: a hitman working for L.A. organized crime in the form of Carlito (Carolos Sanz), a boss more interested in his own power than the welfare of his employees. A job goes bad and Chelios finds himself in hot water, vis-a-vis a "Beijing Cocktail" helpfully injected into his unconscious body by wannabe bad guy Verona (Jose Pablo Cantillo). The "cocktail" is a synthetic mixture of really bad stuff that requires Chelios (Statham) to maintain extremely high adreneline levels or die. This (established within minutes of the opening) sets the stage and the race is on.
No time is wasted here: Crank keeps the pedal down and the pace insane as Chelios tries desperately to keep himself pumped by doing every kind of risky behavior imaginable, including standing on a motorcycle while driving it, screwing his girlfriend (Amy Smart) in public, taking an enormous amount of drugs, driving Blues Brothers-style through a shopping mall during the day, and picking fights with anonymous street toughs in an attempt to keep his heart pumping long enough to get revenge on the man who did this to him.
In itself that's enough these days to warrant my attention: it's not easy to make an original action movie, it seems, without reference to supernatural forces. Yes, the basic premise has been done before, most directly in D.O.A. (1950) and the Dennis Quaid 1988 remake, but the similarity ends there. And lest you think this is a knock-off unworthly of your attention let me say two words: Amy Smart.
No, I wasn't overly impressed with her in the sadly unrealized Rat Race (2001), but that wasn't her fault. She makes it up in Crank as Eve, the almost entirely clueless Beverly Hills blonde who, nevertheless, seriously loves Chelios despite some serious obstacles, not the least of which is his impending death. Yet the pairing is light and comical. This is, after all just a movie, and we get a self-referential nod here as if to say: "We know it and you know it: it's just a movie. Relax and enjoy the situations unfolding."
Now the breakneck pace and tone of this flick wouldn't be possible at all without top-notch editing, so in the true nature of this column let me give mojo kudos to Brian Berdan, who also edited Nixon (1995) and the excellent Natural Born Killers (1994). Equally fabulous is the complementary soundtrack work thanks to Paul Haslinger and an ecletic mix of modern rock which punctuates the action well.
Well worth your time and moola, don't wait for the DVD: get thee to a theater, grab a bucket of corn and get ready for the fireworks.