Let's face it, men and women are pretty much wired in different ways. While there are obviously exceptions to the rule going both directions, the sexes often view and react to things quite differently. Take, for instance, movies. While both sides of the gender fence share fondness for comedies, dramas, and yes, even horror films, they usually split regarding formulaic romantic comedies and over-the-top action flicks.
Outfitted with the XY chromosome pair, I usually prefer the latter over the former, even when I know I probably shouldn't. Yet, when such action pics are done right -- in terms of eliciting a visceral response targeted at the male mindset -- it's easy (or at least easier) to forgive any number of cinematic sins that might and usually do accompany such visual thrills.
For yours truly, the basic litmus test of whether such a film has succeeded in tapping into such male hard-wiring is whether it makes you want to drive fast after seeing it. And that very adrenaline rush is what occurs during and after "Wanted."
An outrageous, goofy, and preposterous, but highly stylized, ultra violent, in-your-face experience, the film comes from the hands of Timur Bekmambetov, the Russian director behind the cult favorite "Night Watch" pics. Borrowing liberally from the Wachowski brothers and what they offered in their "Matrix" movies, the effort -- written by Michael Brandt & Derek Haas and Chris Morgan -- is a prime example of style over substance (and/or smarts, believability, etc.).
Considering it's based on a comic book series by Mark Millar and J.G. Jones, perhaps that shouldn't come as much of a surprise. Things certainly start off with a bit of silliness (that's presented seriously) where voice-over narration informs us of the secret formation one thousand years ago of a group of weavers who banded together to create an assassination outfit. And when we later learn that a loom somehow decides who's next going to bite the yarn, uh, dust, the material reaches exalted levels of silliness.
But c'mon, it's a male empowerment fantasy flick, so what are you expecting? In short, James McAvoy plays the proverbial 98 pound weakling, but rather than a bully kicking sand in his face at the beach, his boss (Lorna Scott in full-bore rabid mode) reads him the riot act daily and then some. Not to mention his best friend/coworker is bedding his girlfriend, and his father walked out on him when he was a week old. And to make matters worse, when he Googles his own name, there are no results. In effect, he's a zero.
And then along comes Angelina Jolie in "Mr. and Mrs. Smith" kick-butt mode who rescues him from an apparent assassin who she says just killed his father. With some wild driving and even fancier shooting, she saves and then takes him to see her boss (Morgan Freeman doing the serious and intense rather than friendly and jovial thing this time around).
They inform him that he's inherited his dad's special physical and observational abilities (earlier misdiagnosed as classic anxiety attacks) and just needs to be taught how to hone them. Faster than you can say "cue the montages" he's trained in the ways of being an assassin that not only include the ability to shoot bullets in a way that makes them bend around obstructions in their flight path, but also some sort of goopy substances that promotes overnight healing from severe beatings and lacerations (sadly, no one spouts the Pythonesque "It's just a flesh wound").
It just keeps getting goofier as it progresses, but Bekmambetov has his directorial foot so firmly planted pedal to the metal that you can't help but be yanked along for the adrenaline rush ride. Much of the preposterousness is never explained, including an early scene featuring a man who runs down a hallway, blasts out through a window and flies across what appears to be hundreds of feet between one high-rise and another across the street to shoot down some people who want him dead.
Yes, standard physics are thrown out the window along with the logic (at least in made sense in the fabricated, most anything goes world inside the "Matrix" pics), but there's no denying it looks cool. And that's really the point, along with shooting lots of bullets and felling lots of opponents, often in slow motion or with some sort of camera trickery to make it that much more visually impressive.
Sure, there's a (not entirely unexpected) story development where things turn out not to be how they initially appear, but the plot is about the farthest thing from the point of this visceral madness. Instead, it's to get the juices flowing, and thus in a way is quite similar to last year's "Shoot 'Em Up," even if McAvoy doesn't quite have the believable physical presence of Clive Owen for such action.
But for those looking for an instinctively engaging zero to anti-hero tale, filled with all sorts of imaginative and hip visual shenanigans, one could do far worse than this offering. Not the smartest action flick out there and clearly too influenced by the "Matrix" pics to come off as original, "Wanted" nevertheless knows what it wants to be and what it's target audience is expecting, and delivers on both counts. It rates as a 5.5 out of 10.
![[Logo]](/images/screenit_logo2.jpg){kind=logo}
