Mark Wahlberg stars as Chris Farraday, a Mark Wahlberg-esque Mark Wahlberg and top international smuggler who, not wanting to rot in stir with Pops now that he's married to Kate Beckinsale and has two athletic young sons, has gone straight installing alarm systems. But Kate's kid brother owes a whacked-out hood (Giovanni Ribisi, typecast) seven hundred large, so Chris has to make one last run to Panama for the huge score that'll solve everyone's problems. He enlists best bud Sebastian (Ben Foster) to reunite his team and watch over Kate and the kids (Sebby's also trying, but failing, "to bring you a show with no intoxication").
"Contraband" is a decent January movie with a better-than-January cast. It's competently directed and looks good, and it's even a little bit of fun (J.K. Simmons brings humor to a few scenes). It's also glib and pat and creaks of hoary tropes, and the action is never all that exciting. The least appealing element, though, is the treatment of the Beckinsale character, regressive and objectified from the start but abused very badly by the end in a way that adds nothing to the picture.
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