The Ledge

Starring: Charlie Hunnam, Terrence Howard, Liv Tyler, Christopher Gorham, Patrick Wilson

Director: Matthew Chapman

Genre: Drama, Thriller

Rating: C

Athiest Gavin Nichols (Hunnam) is about to commit suicide by jumping off a ledge.  Detective Hollis Lucetti (Howard), who is having a particularly bad day to begin with, is responsible for negotiating with Gavin and attempting to get him to come down.  Over the course of the film the story goes back and forth between the present and the past, following the events that lead to these two men being there - for Hollis, it's what happened after he discovered that he's sterile and his kids aren't his kids, and for Gavin it's the development of a relationship with his neighbour, Shana (Tyler), who is married to the Christian fundamentalist Joe (Wilson).

Okay, so to start, I loved the ending of this film.  It wasn't what I expected at all, and I love how they decided to just go with it.  I really liked it.

The ending was probably the only thing that I liked about the film, though.  I found the characters portrayed by both Hunnam and Wilson to be unlikable - I thought that both of them were trying to go to great lengths to offend the other, which in turn just offended me.  It bothered me that the whole thing was based on the idea that the two of them were going to be trying to force their religious beliefs (or lack-thereof) on the other, and then that Hunnam's character decided to sleep with Shana in an attempt to get back at Wilson's character for being religious.  In the end, I think I really understood Wilson's character's motivation the most.  Even though I didn't support him, or even like him, at all, I could at least see his reasoning.

As for Terrence Howard's character... I really didn't see how his back story was relevant to the rest of the film.  It was unnecessary and kind of stupid.  That being said, I did really like the way that they handled the actual negotiation.  I liked the relationship that was built between Howard and Hunnam.  Asides from the conclusion, that was possibly the best part of the film.  There was this potential here, and they just kind of wasted it.