Reviewed by Mike Anderiesz
Stars Timothy Olyphant, Dougray Scott, Olga Kurylenko,
Robert Knepper, Ulrich Thomsen, Ian Henry Cusick, Michael Offei, Christian Erickson, Joe Sheridan, James Faulkner
Written by Skip Woods, based on the Eidos game
UK certification 15 | UK RRP £19.99
DVD Region 2 | Runtime 100 minutes
Directed by Xavier Gens
There are some phrases that inspire instant panic in the heart of any movie fan. ‘Starring Madonna’, that’s one, ‘remake’ is another, but top of the list has to be ‘based on the popular videogame’. Whether it’s Lara Croft, Super Mario or Resident Evil, you can count on them being badly acted, lazily written and directed by an ex-pop video guy unable to see the irony that most videogames are made by pop video wannabes. Hitman is just another in that long and instantly forgettable line.
Here is a movie that dearly wants to be the Bourne Identity, combining a near identical score with similar European locations, a deadly but childlike hero and an evil faceless agency turning on its own assassin. Yet all these elements are tied together by a weak and confusing script and a singularly unimpressive cast. Admittedly, it all looks rather good — as any movie with the scrumptious OIga Kurylenko is bound to, but for every Olga there’s a Dougray ‘who needs personality with a jawline like this’ Scott. And while Timothy Olyphant does his best as the eponymous hero, he has nothing of Vin Diesel’s screen presence, the original first choice for the part.
Of course there’s a plot of sorts, but I won’t bore you with the details because you can easily make up a better one up yourself from the obligatory elements. Hero falls for his mark (check), people get assassinated from 4 kilometres away (check), Interpol agents swan around barking orders like anyone gives a toss about Interpol (check), and a series of unlikely shootouts in Ferrero-Rocher style hotels. Even the coolest thing in the game merely adds up to another unlikely movie premise. Why would anyone stamp a supposedly invisible assassin with a highly distinctive barcode on the back of his head — so he can get through Tesco checkouts quickly? I don’t think so.
I could go on, but you see the point. The pity is that plenty of money has obviously been spent on all this hokum, enough to pay a scriptwriter more than minimum wage to do it justice. All of which suggests the best use of our hitman’s talent might be to stop Eidos turning any more of their dumb, fatuous franchises into yet another dumb fatuous movie. It also proves how Luc Besson will produce just about anything these days so long as it involves pyrotechnic gunplay and a half naked woman — a far cry indeed from his glory days of The Big Blue.
EXTRAS *** Quite a few, including featurettes on the making of, score, videogame fanchise and, rather inappropriately given the subject, a gag reel.