Wanted

Sunday, July 13, 2008

I love action movies, but I thought the trailers made this one look pretty retarded. I'm all for crazy over-the-topness, but it's a fine line good crazy and bad crazy. My opinion is: a ridiculous action movie usually fares better when it's just trying to be silly and funny (say, Shoot 'Em Up), and when it tries to be cool or stylish it just ends up looking stupid (like Ecks vs. Sever, or Charlie's Angels). Well, I was kinda stunned to see this one get some pretty good reviews, so I figured I'd check it out.

It's a somewhat fun combination of intentionally funny and unintentionally retarded that almost kinda worked for me, but I think ultimately I have to give it the thumbs down because of its awful, awful screenplay. It has this scattered voice-over narration that really desperately wants to be all witty and sardonic like the Fight Club narration, but lacks wit or insight and ends up coming off as whiny and obnoxious. It's pretty insufferable, and it doesn't help that James McAvoy, using a fake American accent, tries to make the character sound as bitchy and twerpy as possible.

Still, I don't think I could completely hate a movie where a man shoots a hole through another man's face, then sticks his gun through the hole to shoot people on the other side, while using the corpse as a shield. I didn't ultimately care for Wanted, but at least I didn't feel like I had wasted my time.