Editor’s Note: This review was originally written back in 2021.
I woke up feeling like crap this morning, hours before I had anything important to do. After getting a cup of coffee and scrolling through online streaming options, I settled in and watched Freejack, a 1992 sci-fi film currently streaming on HBO Max. The first time I saw Freejack was on VHS a year or two after its initial release, and I haven’t thought much about it since. So, today’s viewing was a bit of a clean slate.
Freejack stars Emilio Esteves as Alex Furlong, a Formula-1 race driver who seemingly dies in a fiery crash in 1991, when in fact he is plucked from his timeline at the moment of death and transported to the dystopian future of 2009. The purpose of the plucking is so that old, rich white people facing death can have their minds transferred to a healthy, young body, a sort of immortality in stages effect. Furlong escapes his captors and becomes a “freejack” – a body out of time and on the run, which is considered the property of the old white dude who paid to have the time travel performed.
I did say this flick takes place in 2009, right? A 2009 that is utterly divided between the haves and the have-nots. There is no middle class of any kind – you either live in squalor or luxury. A 2009 in which there is no longer an ozone layer on Earth, and nearly everyone is diseased and dying. In the 18 years Alex missed, there are references to “the Trade Wars” and a ten-year global depression. There is no evidence of a police system, nor is there any real reference to any government. Instead, it seems like the evil corporation controls all. Despite these setbacks, the future does have laser guns and a computer system capable of holding the human consciousness of a deceased person for days, while still allowing that person to interact with the world. Also, videophones in the car! I used to have a 2010 Volvo sedan – nice and luxurious, but no video phone, and looking a lot less stylish than the cars in this film.
The love interest is played by Rene Russo, who loves Alex in 1991 and loves him still in 2009 – even though she is now old enough to be his mother. The primary antagonist is played by Mick Jagger, who for some reason decided he wanted to expand beyond his role as a rock’n’roll god and be a movie star, and there couldn’t be a better possible vehicle to make him a movie star than Freejack. Elvis did surf movies, the Beatles did acid-trip adventures, why shouldn’t Mick do a cheesy sci-fi flick? Interestingly, his is the only character in the film with any sort of development arc, as he transitions from bad guy to good guy through the course of the narrative. Was this supposed to be his starring vehicle? The director , Geoff Murphy, had previously worked with Estevez in Young Guns II (and went on to direct one of the worst films ever, Under Siege II: Dark Territory). The other bad guys filling the gap when Jagger is off-screen are David Johannsen, Jonathan Banks and Sir Anthony Hopkins, who is ultimately the bad guy in charge of all the other bad guys – the “boss” villain, for all you gamers out there.
The soundtrack is full of great bands, including The Jesus and Mary Chain and Ministry, but their songs are used as blink-and-you-miss-it background noise. The only song on the soundtrack that gets heard clearly is a Scorpions tune used as the end credits music. Otherwise, moodsetting is left to the original synthesizer score by Trevor Jones, which is not his best work.
Overall, the film is sullen and depressing, and accomplishes little. The ethical concerns over abducting someone from the past and bringing them into the future as “meat” are never addressed in any real way by anyone. This could have been a powerful storyline, but the writers and director went for a simple chase movie instead. One of the few bright spots is provided by a surreal monologue given by character actor Frankie Faison, and it alone is worth the time to watch the movie. Otherwise, be thankful Mick Jagger kept singing instead of acting.
