27. Wanted

 Or as this blog post could be also known as, Matt rants about Mark Millar for a little bit.

Hoo boy! Mark Millar huh? There's a guy who peaked about 10-15 years ago, right? I mean to be fair to the guy, when you've been in the business writing comics for so long, your best ideas are going to be used up eventually leaving you with whatever dregs he's writing for 'Millarworld' these days. And there's that whole 'Millarworld' ego trip thing too, an acquisition I'm sure Netflix are looking at now, wondering why they coughed up the dough, yielding little results.

Still, to be fair to the guy, he has written his fair amount of noticeable stories. The Avengers in film series wouldn't have existed if The Ultimates hadn't come to life and I still have a soft spot for the first Kick-Ass  and Kingsman films.

Truth is that's why I could see why Netflix made the deal, the man was on a hot streak, it looked as if he could do little wrong. Another success story at the time, was today's film and we'll be revisiting the world of:

WANTED (2008 dir. Timur Bekmambetov)

 McAvoy's shoulder had seized up so whatever 'cool pose' you thought he was doing, he's actually in tremendous pain...

Why I bought it/Why I liked it:

I think one theme that we've been hitting on constantly that's become pretty obvious is the following:

Matt likes big bombastic action films.

Wanted certainly filled that quota at the time. In fact, there was a little swell of Wanted mania about the place as I remember vaguely playing the video game adaptation for this on the Xbox 360 to boot. But it ticked a whole mess of boxes:

Extravagant bullet battle sequences with the often remembered 'bendy bullets'? Check.

Smoking hot Angelina Jolie purring her way through every scene she was in? Check.

Typically dependable Morgan Freeman performance. Check.

So inevitably it pleased a young mid twenties Matt in the way that many an explosive action film had and featured enough unique gimmicks at the time that sort of put it ahead of the pack and was an easy pick up in CEX when said film had dropped in price.

But as we know, nostalgia puts a funny sheen on things and I legitimatley haven't revisited this film in years. Hell, when I composed a top action film list of the noughties, this didn't even cross my mind again, so was this simply a case where its cute little gimmicks outweigh what could be construed as a mediocre noughties outing now? That's what we're here to find out...

If I think it'll stay in the collection:

Honest to God, I have no idea. The fact that I thought another film was AFTER Warrior and then was slightly disappointed that I had this movie first sort of summed up my feelings on watching Wanted today. 

It sort of has that 'Noughties' feeling about it, like chugging a can of Red Bull. You drink it and you're like 'Whoo, I'm all pumped up, that was AWESOME!' but then you grow up, you drink coffee now and you look back on your energy drink quaffing days and think 'Man, I was an idiot'. That's sort of the vibes I'm getting from today's revisit...

The review:

In hindsight I actually appreciate going back to revisit these movies in my collection as it gives me fresh eyes in which to view them with.

With that I can comfortably say that there is an arrogant stench of wankiness that permeates all throughout Wanted that just keeps burrowing under the skin and that ultimately becomes unlikeable. Like the equivalent of the talented sportsperson in your secondary/high school who you thought was cool back when you were a kid but ultimately realise they were a tosser. That's what this film is.

There are some pretty cool action sequences in this, particularly towards the end of the second into the third act. There's something strangely satisfying about watching James McAvoy's Wesley shoot Mark Warren in the eye, ram his gun butt through the socket and kill people while firing through Warren's head.

But that's sort of where the fun ends, other than the novelty of spotting the delightful Chris Pratt in an early role couple with the usage of Rupert Holmes' 'The Pina Colada Song' that just made me wish I was watching Guardians Of The Galaxy instead.

These three had knackered Rocky's training session...

 So the bad then. Look, I like James McAvoy, I've enjoyed a ton of things he's been in, but you can tell this is his first American film and his accent is pretty jarring all the way throughout. There's this feeling that he's been asked to summon the ability of Michael J Fox throughout this film too. But where Michael J Fox can just effortlessly turn on his boyish charm and suck you in, the same can't be said for McAvoy's Wesley here.

Seriously, by the time he's screamed 'Eeeyaarrrr!' or 'Arrrrghhh' by the eighth time, you're kind of hoping he'll get a bullet in his head or his jaw wired shut, there's just this air of annoyance. Ramped up by his pissy little narrative which seemed like fun back in the heady days of 2008 but now just grates. Then by the third act where he's essentially insulting the audience, my mind had been made up, I flipped the screen the middle finger.

Then there's the soundtrack, Danny Elfman's annoying guitar stings, the ability to make Nine Inch Nails seem tame and whiny. Couple this with Bekmambetov's directorial approach. Pretentious slow down shots and then sped up, Slowed down speech. It's the sort of shite that would give Olivier Megaton wet dreams.

Sad reality is this would probably mark the last good role Angelina Jolie would be in and just serves as a reminder that Morgan Freeman is a consummate professional in whatever he appears in.

Should it stay or should it go?

As soon as Wesley utter's the line 'What the fuck have you done with your life', I'd agreed that the movie needed to be slung onto the now dusty trade pile. There's just parts in it that had me itching to check how much run time I had left. It wasn't a completely unenjoyable experience but like I said, that swagger this movie has just got on my tits. A time wasting 6 out of 10 experience then but I could easily waste another 10-15 years, even 20, before revisiting this again.

Until next time, I remain,

Matt Major.