Let’s go ahead and lay down odds now for when we’ll see the first news report about some idiot fourteen year old who was playing with his dad’s gun and shot up his friend because he thought he could curve the bullet and shoot around him. It’ll happen. It’s a sure thing.
I hadn’t even heard of this movie until a few weeks ago when a friend showed me the trailer, but I gotsta say, holy **** was that ****ing AWESOME! And not awesome in a “wow such a testament to beautiful filmmaking” way, but awesome in that “yeah kill him!” way that is very different yet just as satisfying. Contrary to what your douchebag friend who never got off his Kevin Smith kick says, it’s not a bad thing to enjoy movies who’s main function is to slap you in the face with smash ’em up fight scenes and cool special effects.
In Wanted, James McAvoy plays Wesley Gibson, the loser inside all of us who’s resigned to spending the rest of his life taking crap from everyone around him. Of course, things take a turn for the awesome when Wesley meets the enigmatic Fox, played by Jolie, who tells him that his father belonged to a super secret guild of assassins, and that they’ve chosen him to hunt down his father’s killer. After that, it’s a rollercoaster ride as Wesley discovers the truth about his father, and the assassins who employed him.
I really don’t have anything bad to say about the movie. Solid acting. I hadn’t seen McAvoy in anything before and really enjoyed his performance. I think he’s probably one of the only actors around his age who could have pulled the roll off. If the movie had starred Tobey Maguire I’m pretty sure I would have hated it. For all those looking to jump on that train, Angelina Jolie shoots lots of guns and looks good doing it. Anyone who’s seen commercials for the movie knows that there’s a certain suspension of disbelief involved. I think a strike in the movie’s favor is that it hits you with an intense story, but so it won’t disappear up it’s own a**, levels things out with humor. And humor that’s actually funny, not that “someone dies and James McAvoy takes off his sunglasses and gives us that, ‘Looks like he’s having a bad day’,” crap we see so much these days.
One knock against the movie is some of it’s backstory. They explain where the Fraternity, as it’s called, comes from and how they choose their targets. Some of this will make you cock your eyebrow a bit. It shouldn’t take you out of things too much.
Go check this one out in the theaters, and then buy the Blu-Ray and watch it over and over again on your awesome Bose soundsystem until your friends don’t come around anymore. For as much as I’ve gushed about this movie, I can’t give it a completely perfect score because that’s reserved only for movies like The Departed and There Will Be Blood, but it hits right up there. Make sure to stay through the end of the credits. In a hidden scene, Wesley is met by Tony Stark, who tells him that he and some friends are putting a special team together. Fantastic.
8 out of 10 stars
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