I saw The Hitman’s Bodyguard in the cinema a few nights ago with a friend, and decided I’d put up some thoughts about the movie. I’m still working on the format of this “movie review” style blog entry, so this is my first attempt at one.
The Setup
The movie follows lead character Michael Bryce (played by Ryan Reynolds), a protection agent who’s fallen on hard times after a job went wrong, as he’s tasked with escorting notorious hitman Darius Kincaid (played by Samuel L Jackson) across Europe so that he can testify in the trial of former dictator Vladislav Dukhovich (Gary Oldman) in exchange for the release from prison of his wife, Sonia (Sonia Hayek). Of course, that’s a far from simple task, not least of all because the two men have a lot of history, and their trip across Europe is a race against time – and various obstacles sent by Dukhovich to stop them – to make it in time.
The Delivery
I’ll start out by saying that it’s not a terrible film, but neither is it one that I’ll be relentlessly singing the praises of. It’s billed as a “comedy” but that should probably be revised to “action comedy” or maybe just “action movie that’s humorous”, because while the film does have some good laugh out loud moments it came off more like a half-decent action film than a great comedy. That said, I’m not opposed to an action film, so I enjoyed it for that. The action scenes in it aren’t bad either. There’s a few gun fights which are memorable, and a scene in Amsterdam (I think) where Samuel L Jackson is in a boat chased by a bunch of guys trying to kill him on cars, chased in turn by Ryan Reynolds’ taking them out from a motorbike. While it was never suspenseful enough for you to think that either character’s lives were actually in danger, it was a good sequence that I enjoyed watching. The sequence that followed it was decent as well. It wasn’t a stand out moment for the film, but again it was a decent “rescue” sequence which turned the two main characters from enemies who are forced together into more of a respectful partnership.
The main problem the film had, in my opinion, is that it wasn’t really all that funny. Yes, there was humour in the situations they found themselves in, and there were some decent lines that made me smile, but there was nothing that really had me rocking in my chair laughing. The same is true of everyone else in the cinema. The biggest laugh in our particular showing was probably from a scene involving Salma Hayek, playing Sonia Kincaid, the wife of Samuel L Jackson’s character, who spends almost the entire film in a jail cell as she’s imprisoned for her association with her husband, and he’s only going along with the agreement to testify to see her released. That said, there wasn’t anything wrong with the rest of the jokes. It’s not that they were unfunny. It wasn’t painful to watch. But at the same time it just wasn’t laugh out loud funny, which is a pity since I feel like these two actors could have done a lot more if they’d had more to work with. If anything it was the two of them – Ryan Reynolds and Samuel L Jackson – who saved the film from being worse than it was just because they’re both very watchable actors, and Samuel L Jackson was in his typical form. Think “Snakes on a Plane” kind of role. If you liked that (which fortunately I did), you’ll probably like this.
The main characters are interesting enough. Neither is as straight-forward as the descriptions I gave their roles quite implies. Ryan Reynolds’ character is down on his luck, having been riding high when the movie began with his own protection agency and beautiful girlfriend, only to see both his career and his relationship fall to pieces after he loses a high-profile client. By the time he’s hired to escort Samuel L Jackson’s character he’s bitter, angry at the way his career has turned out, and only agrees to the job because he’s promised his former life back again if he succeeds. Samuel L Jackson’s character, on the other hand, is far from the typical “gun for hire” hitman, he’s a romantic who’s only agreed to the deal he takes to get his wife out of prison, and spends much of the movie recounting the story of how he wooed her and giving love advice to his embittered bodyguard. There’s some humour to be found in that, not least of all when he tells the story of why he fell in love with his wife in the first place – she was a waitress who beat down half a bar full of horny guys when they got too close for her liking – and the lengths he’ll go to impress her. Another element to Samuel L Jackson’s character which provides some humour, but could have been used far more, is his overconfidence in his own hitman abilities, and the fact that he’s damn near unkillable throughout the film (something even his bodyguard hates about him at one stage).
Ultimately there’s no real shocks in the film and the plot is standard for films of this type. The bad guy ultimately gets taken out, his accomplishes all end up suffering for working for him, the good guys win, the lonely-bodyguard gets his girl back, and they all end up living happily ever after. I do wonder if there was a shock twist in there and the movie ended in a non-Hollywood style whether I’d rate it higher than I do as I feel like they could have at least tried to take some risks with the story, but it feels like they just settled for the “safe” option on everything. Unfortunately, due to that, that’s just kind of what I think of this movie. The plot is a safe buddy-comedy style plot. The humour is all very safe humour, neither outrageous nor dark. And it’s nothing that we haven’t all seen a few dozen times before, albeit with two really cool actors in it and a few enjoyable action sequences.
The Verdict
I’m not going to go for the cliché “stars” or “score out of ten” system. Nor will I tell you whether you SHOULD avoid films or not. I think everyone’s taste is different and there are very, very few films I’d tell you that you absolutely shouldn’t watch. So instead, I’m going to create my own rating system, and this is going to be my debut of this rating:
Watch it on Rental/Netflix
If, like me, you enjoy a decent action movie with a little comedy in it then you’ll no doubt enjoy this film. You won’t be raving about it afterwards, but neither will you be cursing yourself for having wasted your time with it. I wouldn’t recommend spending the kind of money it costs to go to the cinema and see it as it’s definitely not worth the standard two-adults-plus-drink-and-popcorn style prices to see, but when it does the rounds on Amazon (especially for their £1.99 rental for Prime Customers right now) or if/when it makes its way to Netflix then check it out there. It’s worth a watch, if only to make a drinking game out of how many times Samuel L Jackson says a particular two-word combination he’s somewhat known for saying in films like this.