Penny Thoughts ‘12—Lockout (2012) *½

PG-13, 95 min.

Directors: James Mather, Stephen St. Leger

Writers: Stephen St. Leger, James Mather, Luc Besson

Starring: Guy Pearce, Maggie Grace, Vincent Regan, Joseph Gilgun, Lennie James, Peter Stromare

“Lockout” is one of those big, muscley, testosterone driven sci-fi flicks that hasn’t the slightest clue what science fiction is supposed to be about. It thinks that sci-fi is just an action subgenre that has more spectacular opportunities for things to blow up because it takes place in the future and the things that go boom look slightly different than they do in our time, and the things that make them go boom look different too.

The movie involves a cop who is framed for the murder of his partner. When the president’s daughter is caught in the middle of a jailbreak at a maximum-security space prison, it’s more than a matter of convenience that the cop has already been prepped for interment there. They send this suspected dirty cop to nab the First Daughter in exchange for a full pardon. Of course, it’s also an opportunity to really clear his name, since a key witness is also imprisoned in the facility. Of course, there are two madmen leading the prisoners in an attempt to bargain their way to freedom as well.

Hrmm. What else is there to say? Guy Pearce looks buff as the cop. Maggie Grace seems to have gained some leading action lady beauty as the First Daughter. The frame up is due to some corruption in the government. Um, no real plot surprises here. I suppose if you like this sort of thing, you’ll like this. If explosions for the sake of explosions aren’t your thing, you may wish to keep searching.