Killer Elite

Based on a true story?? It's 1980. Danny (Jason Statham) and his mentor Hunter (Robert De Niro) fail their latest scheme because Danny didn't want to take a little girl. Then one year later, Danny is living in self-imposed exile when he receives a photo of a captured Hunter. Hunter had a job from a Sheikh for $6 million to kill the three SAS special forces men that killed his sons. The Sheikh has 6 months to live and Danny has to get their confessions and their deaths have to look accidental while the Sheikh holds Hunter prisoner. Spike (Clive Owen) leads the rogue group of ex-SAS assassins.

It's a very convoluted story and it seems like a badly written Bond movie. It's better than most rambling thrillers. That's mostly due to the very effective Jason Statham. The big problem is that I don't find any rooting interest in anybody. Newby director Gary McKendry seems more interested in working out exciting action scenes. What's needed is a reason why I care if either side wins or dies. Part of me like Spike more than Hunter. The movie goes all over the world but this confuses the story more than any good that the exotic locations give. It's basically a mess.

Killer Elite starts with the Jason Statham super-assassin fare, some random Mexican or South American dude is getting whacked and Jason Statham as Danny here kills car-fulls of them. But, then it manages to enormously over-complicate things the way only a British movie can do. There is the secret society called the feather-men (because their touch is sooo soooft), some oil sheik who hires Danny by kidnapping his mentor and a whole slew of characters and sub-characters that inhabit the Killer Elite world that all manage to be a little inconsistent with the rules of the movie.

Jason Statham, DiNiro and Clive Owen star, one gets the feeling they aren't in the movie but are sort of doing their thing floating above it. Statham has to be the super-man, the assassin who can kill a whole army if he wants to, DiNiro has to have his intricate monologues and dialogs, and Clive Owen has to be a badass. It does claim to be inspired by a true story but it's hard to weed out the "it could happen" true part and the chaff that all the big actors drag into the movie. We have the hokey "it's easy to kill but the hard part is living with it" kind of assassin introspection and on the other hand it hints at blood for oil military campaigns and political web but they distinctly form two separate layers in the movie.

As an action movie, it's full of it's shares of shootouts, grisly deaths, car chases and burly men punch-ups. It does that weird thing where goons are shot in the leg or punched in the head rather than killed. I suppose if you don't really care how the plot stupidly unravels itself, it's a decent action movie. But, as a plot, it's over-complicated and borderline nonsensical.

"Killer Elite", not to be confused for the Sam Peckinpah film of the same name, is basically Jason Statham being Jason Statham kicking ass, but this time he's facing off against Clive Owen and a bunch of other, more sophisticated bad guys. But since Robert De Niro showed him the tricks of the trade, it just couldn't get any more macho than it already is.

This movie is not just the typical shoot-em-up action fest. There is an actual espionage plot going underway, and though the screenplay isn't exactly original, the story unfolds in an engaging and intriguing way that I became concerned of the story for once and not just awaiting every action scene. The characters are fleshed out more often than most shoot-em-up movies of late. There's some beams of intelligence in certain scenes, though it's clearly not on the same level of the Jason Bourne movies. It tries hard though, and I have to give it credit for that. Was it really based on a true story? The film certainly doesn't say so, as it presents the somewhat complex tale as the usual Jason Statham ass-kicking fest. No comment there.

Judging from his previous movies I'd say "Killer Elite" is better than Statham's previous outings "The Mechanic" and the dreadful "Blitz". Statham is still great at being badass and here he is no exception, although he actually gets hurt in this film a couple of times. Clive Owen is the best and most convincing actor in the film almost giving Statham a run for his money. De Niro is low-key here but I suspect it's just a warm-up for his next big project with Scorsese. Yvonne Strahovski is just emotional fodder for Statham's character and her moments with him are somewhat clichéd but still, not cheesy, although knowing her role from TV's "Chuck", she deserves better. Dominic Purcell is also quite funny as one of Statham's assassin friends. The rest of the cast was not bad.

Production wise, the settings all look gritty and downbeat and someone's bound to get beaten up or shot pretty good in one of these sets. The music by Reinhold Heil and Johnny Klimek is alright but by-the-numbers. Simon Duggan's cinematography is good too - until the fight scenes. We do not want excessive shaky camera during ALL of the fight scenes, Mr. Duggan. The epic fight scene between Statham and Owen was almost ruined because of this.

If there were some things that would make the film better, they would be - better dialogue at parts, more Owen, and much more De Niro. As it stands, "Killer Elite" is a pretty good, solid and tough action film, and will definitely score a home run with Statham fans.

I eagerly await Statham's "Safe" because I feel that film is going to be genuinely very good.

Overall rating: 69/100

Danny Bryce is a retired mercenary but he is forced to return to work when his mentor, Hunter, is taken captive by an employer after failing to complete a mission. Bryce is told he must finish the job if Hunter is to live. The employer is an Omani Sheikh whose three eldest sons were killed during a war; he wants the Danny to kill the three men responsible... it won't be easy though; they were all members of the Special Air Service. Each man must confess then the death must look like an accident. He, and a small team of associates go after the targets but it quickly becomes apparent that somebody, former SAS officer Spike Logan, knows what they are up to.

This is a decent enough story but it would have been better if it didn't claim to be true. It starts well with a prologue that serves to introduce Danny and Hunter and explain why Danny has retired. The way that he is pulled back into that world is effective enough. Once the action starts it is solid and nicely captures the feel of the early eighties. Jason Statham is solid as Bryce and Clive Owen is equally solid as Logan; although both have been better elsewhere. Robert De Niro is decent enough as Hunter although he is rather old to be playing a mercenary. The story provides plenty of twists and turns, some rather far-fetched. Overall I thought it passed the time nicely; not a must see but still entertaining.

Decent acting from the supporting cast, an interesting story that is thankfully absent any clichés, and a lack of any "gotcha" in the story certainly help this movie stand out. But really it's the pacing that made it for me. Things happen FAST. They happen logically, and reasonably (well, reasonably given the nature of the story) but they happen quickly. The movie does not have any periods of introspection for our main characters. It suggests that they are having those moments, but doesn't linger on them or play them up at all; they are just facts, like everything else that happens in the movie (fights, deaths, kidnappings, etc.).

The story is complicated, involving at least 5 separately motivated factions, but at no time was it confusing (so there was no need for an "aha!" moment).

The fight scenes were all exceedingly well choreographed and fit the story so well that there was never a time when 2 people were facing off just so we could see them fight; I really appreciated that.

All in all, a very satisfying film: lots of action, lots of very good acting, and lots of attention to detail (it really looked like it was the early 1980s).

I was going to give this a 7/10, but as I was writing and thinking about it, I upped it to 8/10.