4/10Watching Timur Bekmambetov’s
energetic new film, Wanted, I couldn’t shake the
feeling I’d seen it all before. On reflection, Wanted
is the cinematic equivalent of a “bitzer” dog –
it’s bits of other movies thrown together. It’s a
bit Fight Club, a bit Sin City, a bit Matrix,
a bit Batman Begins – and not as good as any of
them.
This is definitely one of those films that screenwriters
would call plot-driven. The movie is basically about the action.
The characters are secondary; as is much semblance of common sense.
Mind you, Bekmambetov’s previous films were the Russian
vampire romps Night Watch and Day Watch; so
common sense probably isn’t high on his list of priorities
when selecting film projects.
James McAvoy drops his brogue to play the lead character,
Wesley Gibson. Seems Wesley is a nobody, someone ignored even
by Google. His life involves a mind-numbing job as a “customer
service manager” in a grey, passionless office. He’s
put upon by his boss, and all he has to look forward to in the
evenings is his frosty girlfriend Cathy (Kristen Hager) –
who he knows is having an affair with one of his work colleagues.
But one night in a drug store, he meets Fox (Angelina Jolie).
She tells him that his father – who he hasn’t seen
since he was a baby – was a legendary assassin who’s
just been gunned down. Now she’s giving him the chance to
avenge his father’s death by joining the Fraternity, a league
of assassins. Fed up with his miserable life, Wesley agrees; only
to find that his training under the tutelage of Fraternity head
honcho Sloan (Morgan Freeman) is more brutal than he could have
imagined. Despite the brutality, Wesley grows into the part of
a ruthless assassin.
If the idea of a mild-mannered desk jockey morphing
into a cold-blooded killer seems silly, you haven’t seen
anything till you get into the second half of Wanted.
The silliness reaches a zenith (or rather nadir) in a scene in
which Sloan explains to Wesley just how the Fraternity chooses
targets for its assassins to eliminate. I won’t spoil the
fun for you though, because it’s so ridiculous, it’s
actually very funny.
But
as I said, this film isn’t about logic or even credulity,
it’s about the action and there’s plenty of it. A
word of warning for the squeamish though, much of it is very bloody
and some of it downright barbaric. The frenetic activity begins
basically from the first frame and barely lets up until the last.
Bekmambetov certainly keeps things zipping along, although his
forays into acts of daring that defy the laws of physics become
rather tiresome towards the end.
As an on-screen pairing, the producers could have
done a lot worse than James McAvoy and Angelina Jolie. They’re
certainly an attractive couple, even if their chemistry isn’t
exactly sizzling. I actually bought McAvoy’s transformation
over the course of the movie, and Jolie is as slinky and crafty
as her character’s name suggests. Morgan Freeman pops up
again playing the same kind of character he always seems to play
these days. Indeed, if you see this after The Dark Knight,
you may have problems distinguishing his roles between the two
films. Terence Stamp steps in to provide some menace towards the
end.
For all its stellar cast and significant publicity,
Wanted ends up being a bit of a yawn really. There are
certainly some spectacular sequences but it all just gets so ridiculous,
you have to end up just rolling your eyes.
But
as I said, this film isn’t about logic or even credulity,
it’s about the action and there’s plenty of it. A
word of warning for the squeamish though, much of it is very bloody
and some of it downright barbaric. The frenetic activity begins
basically from the first frame and barely lets up until the last.
Bekmambetov certainly keeps things zipping along, although his
forays into acts of daring that defy the laws of physics become
rather tiresome towards the end.