What is hip?

  Photos from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures Bald is pretty
cool, as Bruce Willis so nicely demonstrates, but
his shifty wayward glance hints of his own personal uncertainty as
to his hipness, implying that whatever lies outside that
fascinating window may indeed be decidedly cooler.

By Kelsey McConnell
Daily Bruin Contributor

In a blaze of squinty, smiley, unshaven glory, Bruce Willis
trounced on the world of action movies in the late 1980s. He was
the essence of cool, and he was loved by young people
everywhere.

But recently, Willis has tried on the roles of romantic
comedians, psychiatrists and something about being unbreakable. His
coolness level has suffered accordingly.

Coming Oct. 12, MGM’s “Bandits” only makes
fans think it’s a bank-robbing movie by headlining an action
star.

“It’s a behavioral comedy, not a heist movie,”
said director and Academy Award-winner Barry Levinson.

Screenwriter Harvey Peyton agrees that the kick is in the people
and not in the plot. “Barry focuses mainly on
character,” said Peyton.

“Character” is an alien concept in early Willis
movies, where the bad guys are just bad and the good guys are just
good. A pretty girl might ruffle some feathers, but no one claimed
“Die Hard” was a psychological commentary on being
human in Postmodern America.

In his action movies, little more was required of Willis than
grunting and a strong trigger figure. And yet, it was the
“Die Hard” trilogy that rocketed Willis into the upper
stratosphere of cooldom. So with this “behavioral
comedy” a serious question arises … is Bruce Willis still
cool?

Opening in the Oregon State Penitentiary with Thornton shouting
“anger management” ring-side at a Willis boxing match
gone awry, nothing seems out of place. Thornton is a geek; Willis
is removing teeth with his fists. And then, somewhere between
Thornton complaining of hypertension and espousing the medical
value of garlic, Willis commandeers a cement truck and the two go
crashing through the prison fence into the Oregon wilderness.
Cement truck, prison escape, all signs point to Willis’
enduring coolness.

  Bruce Willis (right) and Billy
Bob Thornton star in the comedy "Bandits." But wait, that
evening Willis and Thornton sit, dreaming of a Mexican resort and
the stolen money that could get them there. Should Bruce Willis,
godfather of cool, strive to sip sea breezes and check in hotel
customers? In “Bandits” he does, so Willis and Thornton
form a plan: rob a bank with the bank manager’s keys after
kidnapping the manager the night before. Willis dons bad mustaches,
Thornton dons worse wigs, and they successfully rob several
banks.

Thornton carries more of the spotlight in the heist scenes
because he is too good to be bad and that’s just funny.
However, Willis becomes central again when the boys run into Kate
Wheeler (Cate Blanchett) ““ luminous redhead and frustrated
housewife. Willis and Blanchett waste no time in gettin’ it
on, which leaves audiences affirming that Willis is still the
man.

Ultimately, though, Kate entices and is enticed by both men,
which plunges the movie into a spiral of love and love lost which
doesn’t end until Blanchett exclaims, “Together you
make the perfect man.”

Stop. Willis doesn’t get the girl? Weirder yet, he shares
the girl? Yes, and by Willis’ standards, that swims in a sea
of uncool.

Said Thornton, “Even though “˜Bandits’ is
supposedly about bank robbers, it’s really about this wacky
relationship between me and Bruce Willis and Cate
Blanchett.”

As hard as it is for Willis fans to hear, “Bandits”
is about people. Blanchett, Willis, Thornton and Troy Garity
““ as Willis’ simple but honest cousin ““ play
carefully crafted characters, each cornering a different angle of
the human spectrum.

In the movie, Terry Collins is “the smart one” and
his look is as fastidious as his personality. With regards to
Terry, “goofy” is an understatement, but Thornton says
he was comfortable in his character’s skin.

  Bruce Willis in the film
"Unbreakable."

“I think sometimes actors hurt their performance when they
hold back because of the way they look. It’s important to
totally become the character and not worry about how that’s
gonna look,” he said. As true as that advice may be, if
Willis listens he could soon find himself in a musical.

In the end, Willis plays Joe Blake in a way that says good bye
to action-master Bruce Willis. Despite a hideously mousy ponytail
in the beginning of the film, Willis starts off as manly: touching,
eyeing and complimenting women in that oh-so-Willis way.

Gone are the days of macho one-liners followed by more macho
one-liners as “Bandits” catches Willis reading Chinese
philosophy in bed and professing his love for cultural events. This
Bruce isn’t the hip guy who solved the world’s problems
between loud music and louder explosions. It seems that Willis has
sacrificed being cool to start being an actor.