The Hitman's Bodyguard!
Aug. 23rd, 2017 09:25 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
elfsRaen, Omaha and I went out to see The Hitman's Bodyguard. I have no idea what the critics are whining about.
It would seem that the critics, with whom Rotten Tomatoes are tracking about 39% approval for this movie, don't like it very much. They don't like that it's an action/comedy full of comic banter while the villain is a mass-murdering genocidal monster, or that the plot is a thin buddy/roadtrip between Samuel L. Jackson (the hitman) and Ryan Reynolds (the bodyguard).
The plot is basically this: Jackson has to get from London to the Hague to testify against a genocidal dictator, and Interpol has to get him there. The dictator (played by Gary Oldman in high form) has the most elite assassins in the world, and they have to stop Jackson from testifying. Interpol is compromised, and one intrepid and honest agent pulls in a wildcard: her ex-boyfriend, a down-and-out bodyguard "who's a complete idiot at just about everything except keeping people alive."
It's a banter movie. It's a hangout film. One critic complained that "This is a generic action thriller. Only fans of Samuel L. Jackson and Ryan Reynolds will be interested." Well, duh. Who doesn't love Samuel L. Jackson, a man who, as Reynolds says in one monologue, "Singlehandledly ruined the word 'motherfucker?'"
There's also a common complaint that the "chemistry" between Jackson and Reynolds is weak. Maybe so if you were hoping for the kind of cryptohomoerotic mannerbund bullshit that passes for male-male bonding in some movies these days. Instead we get two guys trying very hard to keep each other alive and do the right thing; their focus is not on each other but on the task at hand, a task which involves dodging lots of sinister villains crashing cars and firing guns.
It's a fun movie. All three of us agreed it was great. Not fantastic, not a masterpiece, but definitely worth the two hours and ten bucks-a-ticket price tag. We won't have these actors forever, especially not in their current form. Samuel L. Jackson and Ryan Reynolds both have character and public persona, and fans who love them for those qualities, and letting those two loose on a sound stage was a brilliant idea.
It would seem that the critics, with whom Rotten Tomatoes are tracking about 39% approval for this movie, don't like it very much. They don't like that it's an action/comedy full of comic banter while the villain is a mass-murdering genocidal monster, or that the plot is a thin buddy/roadtrip between Samuel L. Jackson (the hitman) and Ryan Reynolds (the bodyguard).
The plot is basically this: Jackson has to get from London to the Hague to testify against a genocidal dictator, and Interpol has to get him there. The dictator (played by Gary Oldman in high form) has the most elite assassins in the world, and they have to stop Jackson from testifying. Interpol is compromised, and one intrepid and honest agent pulls in a wildcard: her ex-boyfriend, a down-and-out bodyguard "who's a complete idiot at just about everything except keeping people alive."
It's a banter movie. It's a hangout film. One critic complained that "This is a generic action thriller. Only fans of Samuel L. Jackson and Ryan Reynolds will be interested." Well, duh. Who doesn't love Samuel L. Jackson, a man who, as Reynolds says in one monologue, "Singlehandledly ruined the word 'motherfucker?'"
There's also a common complaint that the "chemistry" between Jackson and Reynolds is weak. Maybe so if you were hoping for the kind of cryptohomoerotic mannerbund bullshit that passes for male-male bonding in some movies these days. Instead we get two guys trying very hard to keep each other alive and do the right thing; their focus is not on each other but on the task at hand, a task which involves dodging lots of sinister villains crashing cars and firing guns.
It's a fun movie. All three of us agreed it was great. Not fantastic, not a masterpiece, but definitely worth the two hours and ten bucks-a-ticket price tag. We won't have these actors forever, especially not in their current form. Samuel L. Jackson and Ryan Reynolds both have character and public persona, and fans who love them for those qualities, and letting those two loose on a sound stage was a brilliant idea.
