It would be a stretch to say Hitman: Agent 47 is everything wrong with Hollywood filmmaking
these days. But it does certainly check off more than its fair share of the
boxes on the list. The soulless result is the sort of deeply and completely
uninvolving movie that barely seems to exist beyond the corporate and
commercial whims that spat it up. It seems only right to enumerate my
complaints in list form, if only to grasp for listicle clicks as shamelessly as
the filmmakers tried to cash in on a dormant dud idea.
1. It’s a mercenary remake of 2007’s based-on-a-video-game flop
Hitman, made presumably so 20th
Century Fox can say the rights haven’t lapsed. The little-loved original was a
grim gory shoot-‘em-up about which I remember only distaste. This new version
connects to the original in merely the most general ways despite adapting the
same property. You’d think we’d have one good video game movie by now, but
every one (with the exception of Need for
Speed, the Tomb Raiders, and the Resident Evils, which aren’t great, but have their charms) plays
like a garbage attempt to get money out of a familiar property’s name.
2. It’s an effort in franchise building despite murky
mythology, scattered backstory, and nonsense lore. A tedious voice over during
the opening credits spells out pro forma junk about supposedly cancelled secret
government super-agent programs and evil corporate overlords, but the following
film remains so vague about the specifics it’s like screenwriters Skip Woods (A Good Day to Die Hard) and Michael
Finch (The November Man) knew we’d
seen this sort of thing before and could roll with it. So what if it’s
impossible to tell who wants what or why? We’re just supposed to accept that
some people with guns need to shoot at other people with guns. Got it.
3. It has a faux-expensive-looking CGI sheen over painfully
anonymous glass and steel blues and whites, the better to render, I suppose. We
go from Berlin to Singapore and in the process find similar warehouses and foyers,
long grey hallways and vast cavernous spaces in which to careen digital danger
and phony explosions. There’s never any sense for why we’re going to any
particular building, just that we’re going there to blow it up or repulsively splatter its
occupants against the walls.
4. It features near constant deadening action. Rounds of
ammunition are expended casually and endlessly, turning every opportunity for
excitement into a gross and weirdly passive shooting gallery. We often see characters
turning in slow motion from high angles, spinning and firing two weapons at
once with all the precision of a button-masher on easy mode. This never feels
dangerous. Even car stunts and a helicopter rototilling the side of a
skyscraper feel antiseptic. Watch poor Zachary Quinto scowl his way through the
role of an indestructible henchman, bouncing up for more glowering after every
blow, for a personification of futility.
5. It casts a co-lead as a Strong Female (Hannah Ware) who
is important to the plot’s machinations, and yet is only there to be a pawn or
a prop for male characters who remove her agency whenever convenient for their
plans. She’s a MacGuffin. The story concerns her efforts to locate her
long-lost father (Ciarán Hinds) while being alternately pursued and assisted by
two guys. For all the fighting she gets to do, she’s also constantly imperiled,
and has a scene in a bikini that makes no sense either practically – where did
she get it? – or plot wise – why go swimming when the bad guy is still in close
pursuit?
6. It’s a movie that takes its protagonist, the eponymous
Agent 47 (Rupert Friend, a long way from Starred
Up), and makes him the literal embodiment of bland white male default
blahs. He strides through the scenery without any apparent motivation or
characterization, recognizable only by his simple constant style: a gleaming bald
head with a barcode tattoo, a nondescript black suit, and a blood red tie.
What’s he up to? By the time it’s
clear, it’s too late to care. All we know is that he’s good at shooting people
while looking and moving like he’s in a perfume commercial.
There’s as much reason to see Hitman: Agent 47 as there was to make it. Less, actually, because
although the studio clearly thought they could get people to pay good money to
see it, there’s no such profit motive for you. I can’t say I blame anyone involved, from
first-time director Aleksander Bach, who must’ve thought a relatively big
studio picture would make a cushy debut, to the craftspeople who were
presumably paid good money to design this contraption. And hopefully the actors
had some good catered lunches. But there's no need for anyone to actually see this empty fun-free zone. Prospective audience members should stay home
and eat a sandwich instead. At least that’d have some flavor and purpose.
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