I watched the Harrison Ford vehicle "Firewall" recently.  In general, I think Harrison Ford does a good job of choosing roles that suit his appearance, acting style, and presence.  Firewall is no exception.  He plays the part of a computer security expert whose family is taken hostage in exchange for him helping a group of crooks steal millions of dollars.  Ford plays the part similarly to his role in "The Fugitive" and does it convincingly.

On the whole, this a decent and entertaining film.  Where the film falls down, however, is in its depiction of technical information.  For example, even though Ford's character has been suspected of doing something highly illegal, he's still able to login to the bank's computer systems from a remote terminal at an airport.  In the real world, that account would have been locked down within seconds of the suspicion.

Even ignoring that, his "clever" solution for capturing account numbers off a computer screen is insanely stupid.  It's claimed that by removing the scanning element from his home fax machine and connecting it to his daughter's iPod, he can create a device that will scan account numbers off a computer screen and store them as digital image files.  Yeah, right.  First, the scanner element alone will only create an image in conjunction with the right interface hardware, which an iPod doesn't have.  Second, even if the iPod had that hardware, it doesn't have scanner software built into it to interpret the signals coming from the fax machine's scanner.  This means Harrison Ford's character would have had to design in mere hours a custom hardware and software setup to enable the capture and storage of lots of bank account numbers.  Not gonna happen.  If he had that kind of skill, he wouldn't be working in computer security - he'd be out there designing and building electronic hardware.

Something I also thought was a bit silly was the movie's title.  I don't recall ever hearing the word "firewall" mentioned in the movie, though it might have been.  One would have thought, from the movie's title, that Ford's character would have had to figure out how to break through his company's firewall or that the firewall would somehow be used to save the day.

The actors' performances in the film were all quite good and quite believable.  On the whole, it's an entertaining film, though hardly academy award material. 

The plot overall is pretty formulaic.  The crooks take the family hostage and demand that Ford's character help them rob the bank.  The crooks monitor his every move to ensure that he doesn't tip off the police.  He tries to get help but fails, so he gives in.  He cooks up an outlandish scheme to get the crooks their money.  It works, and he conveniently figures out where they're holding his family by tracking his dog's GPS-enabled collar.  Then, instead of calling in a SWAT team or getting any kind of help at all, he blunders in to save them.

If the plot wasn't so utterly predictable, the performances and tension created by the film would easily be worth an 8 or 9 out of 10 rating.  Unfortunately, the lame "technical solutions" left me with a really bad taste in my mouth and lower the film's overall rating to a 6 or 7.  If you like Harrison Ford and don't mind a predictable plot, you'll enjoy Firewall.  If you like some surprises and appreciate technical accuracy, you probably won't like it much.