Much like fellow screen legend Samuel L. Jackson, John Travolta’s modern career choices have been frequently mystifying and always amusing. 2018 might just be the epitome of late-stage Travolta. First up from this seminal year, we have “Speed Kills,” a crime drama based on the book of the same name. The book is a biography of speedboat designer and racer Donald Aronow, who in the film is named Ben Aronoff.
There’s a recurring theme with a lot of these later Travolta films: all the trailers have the actor introducing exactly who he’s playing right at the top. In “The Poison Rose” trailer, Travolta explains “My name is Carson Phillips, I’m a Hollywood PI. I like to drink, smoke, and gamble.” With “Speed Kills,” he announces, “My name is Ben Aronoff. I’m a self-made millionaire and an offshore boating champion. My boats have won hundreds of races. Oh yeah, they’ve also moved 100 million pounds of cocaine through Miami.” That’s pretty much the gist of this one, and it doesn’t sound like too bad a premise, does it? Unfortunately, the TomatoMeter was not kind to this retelling of Aronow’s life. All 17 reviews on Rotten Tomatoes are negative, with Variety’s Dennis Harvey being particularly merciless with this summation: “What’s not to like? Well, everything.”
But perhaps the most egregious criticism came not from any esteemed reviewer but from Powerboat Magazine, which warned its readers to “Prepare for Disappointment.” Just think about that for a second. You might have thought that, despite the film failing to impress moviegoers or critics with its story, performances, or direction, it could at least please the power boat crowd, being that it’s literally full of their favorite thing in the world. Alas, even the boaters weren’t giving Travolta or his co-conspirators a pass.
