From the creator of 2013's Prisoners, and getting ridiculously high critical acclaim, but Sicario is no Prisoners.
An FBI agent who stumbles upon the dealings of a drug cartel is roped into a special Government taskforce to aid in the neutralisation of the drug trade on the US and Mexican borders.
I don't get the massive critical success of Sicario. I really don't. While director Denis Villeneuve really has his stamp upon it stylistically; it has the same perpetually moody, grim and intense atmosphere, as a story and as a film it really doesn't do anything.
Emily Blunt leads the cast as Kate Macer, an FBI agent who we see in the film's opening stumble across a house where the walls are lined with corpses. This opening is, frankly, the best and most interesting part of this entire film. There's a real sense of dread, a sense of putridity and cruelty that is amplified by the film's score. The film grabs you instantly, but it slowly loosens its grip.
Kate Macer quickly becomes a non-character. She has vague motives at best to help this taskforce, and they (led by Josh Brolin) do not tell her anything; everything is deliberately kept secret from her. Why? That would be the film's anchor, the meat of the story is how this unit alienates and treats her like a ghost. It would be, had the film actually led to anything worthwhile.
On top of this, Emily Blunt can play a strong female protagonist, yet here her character is made to be virtually useless; she even nearly accidentally sleeps with a villain. The mystery of why she is even in this brutal, dangerous place becomes more of a nuisance than a compelling reason to watch.
The film's perspective moves gradually away from Macer completely, and towards Benicio Del Toro's character Alejandro, who is a quiet, seemingly unassuming man within the taskforce who when asked refuses to say who he works for. There's an uncomfortably long stint where we are following a woman we know nothing about, following a man she knows nothing about, for reasons we don't know. And like I said, the film ends with very little pay off for all this mystery.
The film's opening is fantastic. It really, really is. The score, Blunt and Del Toro are also all incredible with the roles they play in the film. The music is unsettling and make the omnipresence of threat from all directions palpable; the film's sense of dread is incredible and does test your wits and drains your resolve.
But it drags itself down with a over reliance on mystery and it loses the audience. Fans of Prisoners might be expecting a twist or two that never come, or audiences are put out by characters we don't especially care about.
I criminally underrated Prisoners, and I would rather watch that again than Sicario.
The Hitman franchise always seemed like an odd choice to be turned into a film franchise; a dark, moody third-person stealth assassin game where you play as an unstoppable killer. The game came to be from Eidos Interactive, a British games company which later became part of Square Enix Europe after the software giant purchased the company. But Hitman was one of their most successful game franchises with eight titles in the last fifteen years.
Anyone outside of the games industry would still find making not one film but also a remake of that film with this franchise a strange choice, especially when video game franchises like Max Payne and Prince of Persia only get one entry so far.
What is interesting is that both the 2007 entry and the 2015 are both directed by relative newcomers and written by the same writer.
It is a perfect opportunity for a Cinema Cocoa Remake Rumble Review!
Hitman (2007)
Hitman in 2007 is director Xavier Gens' only notable feature film, and while half of this film gives plenty of evidence why, the other half isn't that bad.
A covert group known as The Organisation trains an army of lethal assassins known as Agents, but when Agent 47 discovers one of his targets, a powerful Russian politician, survived his attack he becomes a target. With Interpol tracking him down, 47 has to finish the job he started.
This film is a conflict of emotions for me. On the one hand, it has a terrible plot, ambiguous backstory spontaneous action sequences, but on the other hand it is a decent video game movie adaptation with good action and is impressively gory. For every good moment there's another bad one to balance the film's overall neutrality.
Perhaps the most glaringly annoying aspects include lead star Timothy Olyphant as Agent 47, and the script given to him. He just doesn't look like a stone-cold killer; he appears to soft and bright eyed throughout the film, you cannot believe this guy has been raised to be the ultimate killer. He's more like someone pretending to be Agent 47. The other major issue with this film is its opening: a flashback style sequence while Ave Maria plays showing us the orphan kids in training to become Agents, only for some of them to attempt escape.
This isn't referenced again, and 47's relationship with The Organisation seems ambiguous at best in context with this opening, and add to that how the Agents in the video game weren't orphans but in fact clones. I couldn't shake the feeling I had seen this opening before... From the last time I watched this film, right?
Nope. It is footage from James Cameron's television show Dark Angel (2000). They even cite their use of the footage at the end of the film's credits.
Wow. Wow... Not only is your film's protagonist's backstory incorrect to the source material, but the backstory you decided to give is just ripped from something else?
I should condemn this film just for that.
So what could possibly balance this out? Well, it is actually refreshing to watch an action film (an action film based off a video game, no less) that actually has gore and blood squibs used in it! This film includes an action sequence that almost equals some RoboCop (1987) in terms of number of squibs used, its insanely violent. It was wisely rated R and a 15 in the United Kingdom.
Plus there's some nice nods to the game. Agent 47 walking through corridors while the director has the camera tracking behind and above him, like a game's third-person perspective, or Agent 47 breaking into a house to find people playing the Hitman game. Existential crisis there.
It is a bit of a mess. The film feels uninterested in its own plot, focusing on Agent 47 and his lack of heart for female lead Nika (played by Olga Kurylenko) who is quite annoying, reminding me of Transporter 3's female "lead". She didn't seem necessary, as if she could have been written out of the plot.
It is an incredibly throw-away action movie, but in terms of video game adaptations, it wasn't awful.
Hitman: Agent 47 (2015)
This is a remake nobody asked for, and will likely be
forgotten about like its predecessor, but honestly they did alright with this
remake of the popular video game.
After his project of manufacturing perfect assassins is
destroyed, a scientist goes on the run and now only his daughter could possibly
know where he is. She is tracked and hunted down by a mysterious, ruthless
assassin known only as Agent 47, a product of her father’s work, and a new
organisation called The Syndicate.
The main issue I always had with the original Hitman movie
was the script and portrayal of Agent 47; Timothy Olyphant didn’t look like a
genuinely ruthless and methodical killer. In this film, Rupert Friend (of
Homeland fame) takes up the role of 47 and he gives a far more genuine
performance, even channelling some of The Terminator earlier on; walking, not
running, and forever on the heels of our heroine, Katia (Hannah Ware) and her
initial protector John (Zachary Quinto) combined with the slick surroundings
and Agent 47’s impeccable suit.
It is rewarding to see the assassin be a threat, and while
the video game has him as the protagonist I feel a film needs to establish this
man as a cold, emotionless killer, and the film opens with this perfectly. Also Katia's character is a fair few steps ahead of Nika from the original film, in that she is actually integral to the story and she progresses the plot! Agent 47 is more like a means to an end in this film, and other characters supply the story, which is how it should be.
The story progresses neatly enough, hitting all the traditional marks of an
action, chase thriller with some neat little twists in there to keep you
intrigued. Although there are some moments that defy belief: the police officer
interrogating Agent 47 while having a
sniper rifle and ammunition in the room… or some quite incredible
technology that is only experimental today that will raise some eyebrows.
But these are small issues compared to the general lack of tone from the
original film.
I will say though, contradicting the sleek styling the film has, the combat sequences were fairly messy with an abundance of shaky-cam. I thought we were through with this? Hitman would have benefitted more paced, methodical combat instead of frenetic chaos. On the plus side there was still buckets of gore, Hitman incredibly maintaining its 15 certificate and R rating!
While the film is a fairly by the numbers chase film, and it loses a little bit of traction towards the end with its mysterious antagonist, I enjoyed it a fair bit! It had decent acting for a video game movie, the action was decent and the character felt well portrayed.
Additional Marshmallows: Incredibly Hitman: Agent 47 is director Aleksander Bach's debut and also solo career entry on IMDB! Whether he has done more and the site has not been updated, I cannot say, but for a debut director, Agent 47 is something to be proud of!
Keanu Reeves is back in this high octane revenge shoot 'em up. Full of style and plenty of bloody carnage, I enjoyed it a lot.
When a crime-lord's son takes a fancy for John Wick's car, he decides to steal it as well as murder John's pet puppy, mere days after the tragic death of his wife.
What he didn't know, and his father certainly does, is that Wick is a retired hitman; one of the most ruthless and professional killers ever. Despite John having worked for the crime lord, will his cold vengeance remain limited to just the son's life?
John Wick is one of those classic, by-the-numbers action shooters. We have a criminal element that even has the cliche of a hot-headed crime-lord son who's in over his head (played by Game of Thrones' Alfie Allen) we have scenes on a rain soaked graveyard, gunfights in neon-lit nightclubs and knife fights in the rain. There are plenty of reasons to say this film is cliche.
But I enjoyed it a lot. I think its because there's very little narrative fluff and no padding, like forced romance subplots; it is as straight and narrow as you can get. Man is angry, he has an arsenal of guns and a hierarchy of bad guys to blast his way though. Though it does have a nice sense of dry humour running through it, usually coming from the fact that everyone in New York knows John Wick by reputation; the man can just stroll through people's businesses and they know not to bother him.
And I have to say also... I personally don't like dogs, but the producers of this film found one of the most adorable puppies available to star in the beginning of this film. I wasn't convinced I would really care for all of our hero's grievances when I heard the synopsis but damn... it was so cute!
I've always liked Reeves; Speed was one of those action films I watched frequently when I was younger alongside the likes of Die Hard with a Vengeance, and its great to see him here looking positively transformed. He looks grisly and hard, and the film doesn't burden him with silly quips either. As one of Hollywood's nicest guys, he really makes this film work, giving the character a total sense of apathy and reluctance to everything he's doing; all the death and carnage, is just part of the course.
I recommend it to all action junkies. It isn't rewriting any rules by a long shot, but compared to the grand scope of average modern shooters, this one is slick and styled enough to stand above them.
