Those Who Wish Me Dead

A brand new movie just added to HBO Max. A traumatized and retired firefighter who had to protect a boy from those who wish him dead.

When I saw the trailer, I expected a pretty simple thriller. And I was right. The trailer showed most of the story. The plot was seen a bunch of times before, so there wasn't any surprises here.

The acting was pretty decent across the board. There wasn't much complex emotion or scenes that required these actors to show their best.

Even though the plot was simple, I still wanted a decent thriller, and the movie gave me that. There were some pretty okay and intense action scenes, and they were handled well.

My biggest problem was the characters. At the beginning, the movie showed the event that traumatized the main character, played by Jolie. However, I did not see the significance of this event to the story at all. It didn't impact her character when she was in the action scenes.

Besides the main character, there were minimal development to the other characters. Jon Bernthal was badass as usual, but I didn't care for his character much, or any other characters.

Overall, a decent thriller, but everything else was average and not memorable. There's no need to watch this movie. 6/10.

Its not the best movie ever but not the worst good action, you hate the bad guy they do a great job at it, the fire takes a back burner.

All in all a good way to spend 2 hours but you probably won't watch again.

Watch the movie and form your own opinion. It was entertaining enough, a decent "popcorn" movie. Suspend belief, enjoy the movie for the piece of escapism it is.

I cannot remember the last time I've seen a truly "good"movie put out on the big screen. They appear to be getting more and more mediocre as the years go by. Those Who Wish Me Dead was no exception. Actors I used to love, all staring in movies with weak, cliche plots. Big names like Angelina Jolie, Tom Cruise and Denzel Washington hardly mean anything anymore. Nothing new or clever here. This movie is fine as background noise while you scroll through Instagram or Pinterest lazily on a late Saturday night but if you are looking for something to get into, this is not it.

A "Good, Old Fashioned" -{ B i g }- Screen Review .

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Hannah : " I should have gone to them, and instead I was a ( expletive ) Coward " .

Ryan : " Then you'd be dead too " .

Hannah : " ..... That's Our -{ JOB }- " .

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Let me start with the -{ Unbelievably }- natural 12 year old ( when the movie was filmed ) child-actor, native Australian Finn Little ( 'Connor Casserly' ). I have to say that I was just -{ Blown Away }- with the Depth, & the Range of his performance ; charged with a role that was ( literally ) about 25 Times more demanding in terms of its Dramatic & -{ Emotional }- 'heavy-lifting' needs ; than what we are used to seeing the average 12 year old Hollywood thespian tasked with ( in terms of their on-screen assignments ), these days. Bravo 👏❗. The Ever-stunning Angelina Jolie ( 'Hannah Faber' ) , for her part, has -{ most definitely }- " Still Got It " , ( i.e that uniquely quintessential " Supreme Cinematic Fire-power " of hers ) , make - no - mistake . And last but { by -No- means } least, let me just give a quick, yet Massive shout out to the 'second big surprise' of the night, namely ( -relative- ) newcomer Medina Senghore, who does a -{ Stupendous }- job as 'Allison Sawyer', the embattled Deputy Sheriff's very doting, and -{ Equally }- embattled 'six months pregnant' wife .

The overall cinematography , the truly -Sprawling- vistas , and the visual & special effects -{ Both }- in terms of all the thoroughly gripping action-sequences, -{ As Well }- as in terms of the "phenomenally" -real' seeming, & quite frankly, "Terrifying" looking forest-fire scenes . . . . . Were just, well . . . . . 'Hands-Down-Fantastic'. The major problem for ( -Me- ) was : " What I've now come to 'affectionately' label as " The War Of The Worlds ( Tom Cruise, 2005 ) Syndrome 🤷‍♂️ " . Or in other words, & very simply put : " When you -{ Really, Really }- start to get into the picture, and in a -Big- way, no less ; it pretty darn -Suddenly- grinds to a screeching halt, leaving you -Not Only- with the palpable sense of a sort of 'Anticlimax-malaise', but -Also- a few rather Pertinent... 'Outright' ...Unanswered-questions, relating to the film's -{ Genuinely Thrilling }- & 'Mildly-plausible', premise. And finally, & unmissably of course, there's the 'Profound' level of, er... profanity 💥💣 . Yes , I -get- that the film's rated 15 on this very homepage ; in fact that's ( just about ) the -Only- reason I'm -Not- griping about it in my review-Title. But the fact of the matter remains : The somewhat excessive seeming level of -'Hard'- swearing in the movie , coupled with the few brief but nonetheless significant instances of profane ( -Subject Matter- )... in a picture with a, let's not forget, -{ 12 year old }- as its " lead-star " ...was simply -{ Not }- indespensable to the story , -{ Period }- .

Summary : Had me on that ever proverbial 'Edge' { of-my-seat } for the -majority- of its 100 minute run-time. So this movie, with its "sensorily-Explosive" forest-fire backdrop... { No spoilers here, that's ( -very- ) much in the trailer } ...gets a -{ Fairly }- " warm 😉 " , and indeed , -Unflinching- "pandemic-considerate" 6.50 out of 10.00 from me .