First Movie Review: No More Heroes... I mean, Wanted

Movie: Wanted
Director: Timur Bekmambetov
Starring: James McAvoy, Morgan Freeman, Thomas Kretschmann, Konstantin Khabensky and Angelina Jolie.
Genre: Action/Shooter/Comic Book Adaptation
Year: 2008

WARNING: Spoilers Ahead

I’ve seen a few movies at the theater recently, something I don’t do very often, and I’ve been enjoying myself, in some cases despite myself. Seeing this, I thought I’d give a movie review a shot. Wanted is an action movie based on a comic book by Mark Millar and JG Jones. The original comic was about a man who gets drafted into a super villain secret society who basically rules the world because they wiped out all the heroes in 1986. It’s incredibly over the top and features things like a super villain made of shit (named Shithead no less.) The film adaptation retains a number of elements from the comic (Mayhem, the main character’s name) but drops some of the less desirable aspects like rape, hate crimes and super powers. The movie stars James McAvoy as Wesley Gibson, a gutless office drone who suffers from panic attacks and is walked all over by just about everyone he knows, from his anorexic bitch boss to his fuckbender of a best friend who just happens to be screwing Wesley’s girlfriend. All of this changes when Wesley is drafted into the fraternity, an organization of assassins who can slow down their perception of time, bend bullets and select their targets based on the loom of fate (as in A Loom.) What follows is a dark, twisted version of a coming of age story that culminates in McAvoy killing absolutely every other character in the movie. The plot is superior to the comic as it makes the characters in the fraternity a bit more likeable in comparison to their comic book counterparts, but really, the plot of this movie can go fuck itself. I did not go to this movie for the plot, I went to see dozens of people get slaughtered by each other and that’s exactly what I got.

The argument against Wanted is that it rips off The Matrix (Bullet Time, impossible leaps), but it also rips off Fight Club (office drone becomes something more than human.) And I really don’t care. For one, EVERYTHING rips off The Matrix these days, because Bullet Time is so popular. It’s how this movie rips it off that’s fun. Yes, bending the arc of bullets is completely impossible, but really the idea is so ridiculous, what more could you want. More? OK. Angelina Jolie is also in this movie and for what ever reason, she’s very convincing as a super hot assassin. Shocking. Moving on. The movie has many other entertaining things like exploding rats, exploding heads and Morgan Freeman. Not to mention my favorite scene where Wesley smacks his best friend in the face with a keyboard and the letters fly by in slow motion reading “Fuck You” with the “U” at the end of “You” being the guys tooth. This movie doesn’t have a point other then mindless gun slinging violence and it does that extremely well. Mark Millar’s comics aren’t known for their dialogue scenes, they are known for their fight scenes. This movie communicates that perfectly. And it’s kind of fun to watch this nameless burke become a super cool assassin. Perhaps the problem with this movie is it asks you to suspend too much disbelief as all the plot twists are over the top. But I think people are too cynical these days, so shelve your fucking ego and go see this movie you cubical drone. It May not be The Dark Knight, but it’s entertaining as fuck.