In Anticipation - The Mechanic (2011)

Director: Simon West

Cast: Jason Statham, Ben Foster, Donald Sutherland, Tony Goldwyn

Country: United States

Rating: R

Run Time: 93 minutes

Just like Bronson, it has been a long time since I revisited Jason Statham (The Transporter Trilogy) on my blog. I guess it's hard to give every single action icon attention all year round. Maybe I should cut back on the Bruce Willis and Chow Yun Fat reviews since I tend to give them plenty of exposure.

While I think that it was unnecessary to remake a film as good as The Mechanic, I think that it works fine as a Statham vehicle. If you're going to have the balls to recast a Charles Bronson role in a film, than I think an action devotee like Statham is a suitable replacement. Unfortunately, this remake is essentially the same film but with different action set pieces and far less subtlety. Director Simon West makes almost everything in the film as obvious, loud, and simplistic as possible for dumb contemporary audiences. This simplifying of the material hurts the film and takes away what made Winner's subtle and nuanced original so special. Warts and all, The Mechanic remake still shows Statham in prime ass kicking form and has a couple cool action scenes to boot. 

I also have to say, just look at that awful tagline on the film's teaser poster. It might as well say, "someone has to write these taglines, so here you go." It's so bland that anyone could have thought it up. And while you're at it, check out that awesome collage of guns on the poster that won't appear in the film. I wished that old Western revolvers, mini-guns, sawed off shotguns, and RPG's showed up within the film. At least it would have been a little crazier and fun. Fortunately, F2000's and P90's do pop up, so the poster isn't a total lie.

The Transporter becomes The Mechanic.

The Mechanic remake has essentially the same plot as Winner's original but with a slight difference or two. Arthur Bishop (Statham) is an assassin who kills people for a mob-like company. When Bishop's boss Dean Anderson (Tony Goldwyn) asks for him to kill his mentor Harry McKenna (Donald Sutherland), he calls a meeting for proof of McKenna's deservedness to die. Anderson shows Bishop evidence of McKenna betraying and murdering five of his agents in order to make off with loads of money. Even though he regrets it, Bishop does the dirty work and guns down McKenna.

Bishop eventually meets Steve (Ben Foster), McKenna's son, who takes his dad's death pretty hard. After much pressing from Steve, Bishop reveals that he is an assassin and decides to take him under his wing feeling bad for him (this is what I think happens, the film doesn't explicitly state Bishop's reasoning in the remake). As the two start to assassinate targets together, they attract the attention of Anderson and eventually find their lives in danger. However the two eventually learn that their greatest threat is not Anderson, but one another.

In this remake, West and screenwriters Lewis John Carlino and Richard Wenk give a reason for every targets' death. One target is a ruthless warlord, another is a perverted cult leader with a drug addiction, and another is a big guy who likes young men. One of my biggest problems with this remake is that West and the screenwriters try to justify each targets' death. You see in the original, Winner never gave a single reason as to why a target needed to be eliminated and never tried to justify Bronson's Bishop as a good guy. It was simply a film about a guy who kills people because he is told too, plain and simple. This seems to be the big difference between the original and the remake. Back in the day, filmmakers didn't go out of their way to explain things. Their films flowed and audiences went along with it. But now, filmmakers are concerned with making sure audiences understand everything. In doing so, contemporary filmmakers over explain their film's motives and thereby ruin the experience. If West let his film play out and breathe like Winner's original, than it would have been a far better film.

Foster gives 100% to a role that could've been so much more.

Beginning of spoilers for original and remake!

West also ruins The Mechanic's great twist ending by taking all of the surprise out of it and making each character's awareness of one another's eventual betrayal extremely obvious. However, West doesn't just take the surprise out of the twist ending. He ruins it entirely by setting up Steve to enact vengeance on Bishop for killing his father. We also learn that McKenna was innocent! Anderson set up McKenna to be killed by Bishop all along. Therefore, Bishop feels horrible for killing McKenna when he realizes that he was innocent. So when Steve tries to kill Bishop in this film, he is doing it because Steve was wrongfully set up to kill an innocent man.

But it doesn't stop there! Bishop survives! Even though Bishop dies in the original, he was on to Steve's plans and set up a trap to kill him back at his home. In this film however, Bishop does the same thing but gets away to live on in an unnecessary sequel. But now it's horrible that Bishop kills Steve because he never took the time to explain to him what happened with his dad! In the original, Steve never cared about his father's death because he was a heartless bastard. His betrayal of Bishop was great because it showed a young man trying to take his mentor's place. This film on the other hand completely removes that character dynamic and opts for basic revenge instead. Riveting.

End of spoilers for original and remake!

I could go on for a while about why I dislike this revised ending so I'll keep it short and sweet: the original ending is subtle, rewarding, and great while the remake's ending is contrived, a cop out, and disappointing.

That guy in the middle is going to have trouble aiming since his gun is above his eye line.

Another issue I have with this remake is that it gives a face to the villain. In the original, the head of the organization is seen in one scene. He is never heard from again and mostly kept in the shadows off screen. In the remake however, the villain, Anderson, is given a face and repeatedly appears throughout the film. Instead of focusing on the relationship between Steven and Bishop, West crafts a sub-plot where Steve and Bishop eventually go after Anderson in order to stop him and destroy the organization once and for all. This giving the villain a face is totally unnecessary. The original was great because there was no set villain and the original organization's figure head was mysterious and elusive. Now the villain is simply a rich bumbling businessman with an earpiece and a nice suit. As I stated before, this remake is all about making everything loud and obvious. It lacks Winner's nuanced subtlety that allowed the audience to think for themselves.

After all my complaining and moaning, you would probably think that I hate this movie. Well, I don't. Even though I was disappointed in it as if it were a child of mine, I still found it to be entertaining in parts and worthy of a rental at least. If there is one improvement to the original, it is that West's remake has bloodier action, crazier stunts, and a higher body count. I yelled, "Oh!" numerous times throughout the film, so that is always a good sign that the film entertained me somewhat. Statham and Foster show off their skills in numerous action scenes that incorporate cars, boats, fist fighting, and shootouts. It is unfortunate though that most of the blood is painfully digital a-la The Expendables.

There is a fantastic stunt worthing singling out during the final action sequence where Foster drives a bus towards a convoy of cars. After Foster collides with Anderson's convoy, he runs towards the back of the bus as a fireball travels down the middle of it. Foster leaps towards the back and window and rolls out just as the fire explodes out of the bus' window. For all of my complaints about the film, at least I can say that Winner knows how to direct an exciting action sequence.

"May the odds be ever in your favor Bishop."

The film also has a great set piece around the hour mark where Statham and Foster have to take on numerous guards inside of a hotel. This scene also features a great stunt where Foster and Statham free fall down the side of the building while attached to a rope. The scene is shot with cameras attached to the actors in order to immerse the audience in the free fall experience. It is a great little touch that went a long way for me.

Both Statham and Foster's performances can't stack up to Bronson and Vincent's from the original. However, I don't blame this entirely on the actors. I blame it purely on the material they were given to work with. Regardless of the material, Statham and Foster make for a really cool team. They both do a great job during their action scenes and fit well into the world of the film. I usually love Ben Foster in every performance of his. He has the ability to completely steal a film from whomever else is in the picture. Just look towards his appearances in 3:10 to Yuma, The Punisher, Lone Survivor, and The Messenger if you want to see what I mean. Unfortunately, he isn't given much to work with here. Instead of stealing the film as he could have, Foster matches Statham every step of the way.

And how about Statham? Statham is sort of our contemporary Bronson nowadays, so it is ironic that he is in a remake of a Bronson classic. In all honesty, Statham does what he always does; talk in a menacing voice and kill bad guys with style. His performance lacks the silence and subtlety that made Bronson better though. Honestly, Statham's performances rarely ever differ. All of his characters tend to blur and feel like the same guy after awhile. It is usually the plots and action scenes that separate one Statham film from the next. You know exactly what you are getting into with each Statham performance and that is just fine with me. I like the guy and think he is relatively bad ass in all of his films no matter how boring or bad they are (Parker anyone? All I remember is lots of real estate talk in that one).

The mentor and the apprentice wasting round after round on one guy.

I am surprised I wrote an abnormally high amount of words for a remake few people even saw or care about. I guess that is what happens when the action genre is your passion. Anyways, West and Statham do a good job at kicking ass and delivering good action scenes. However, they fail in almost every other area. The Mechanic remake is as by the numbers as they come. It takes a unique and silent film from the 70's and turns it into a dumb headed and loud film from the 2010's. This one is definitely a rental and not worth a second watch.

Rating: 5/10 - An unnecessary remake that offers up nothing new but cool action scenes. Otherwise, this is a by the numbers action film that will displease fans of the original but possibly thrill newcomers.

Franchise:

The Mechanic (dir. Michael Winner, 1972)

The Mechanic (dir. Simon West, 2011)

Mechanic: Resurrection (dir. Dennis Gansel, 2016)

Predator-a-Thon, Part 3 - Predators (2010)

Director: Nimrod Antal

Cast: Adrien Brody, Topher Grace, Alice Braga, Walter Goggins, Laurence Fishburne

Country: United States

Production Company: Troublemaker Studios

Rating: R

Run Time: 107 minutes

I'm sure plenty of you are thinking, "No, Zach! Why did you skip over reviewing the two Alien vs. Predator films in your Predator-a-Thon?" Well don't worry, I'll get to them one day. It's just that I'd rather stick to the three main (and also good) Predator films for now. Besides, I only have so much time in my life and I'm not sure if I want to waste three and a half hours watching both crappy Alien vs. Predator films at this moment.

Predator fans haven't had it easy. The last standalone Predator film for twenty years was none other than Predator 2 from 1990. After the dismal AvP films and the wait since Predator 2, it seemed that the Predator franchise was finished for good. However, 20th Century Fox and director Robert Rodriguez (From Dusk Til Dawn, Desperado) miraculously brought the franchise back to life in 2010 with Predators. Rodriguez had written a script for a new Predator film back in 1994 and never received word on it. When 20th Century Fox re-discovered his old script, they contacted Rodriguez and asked him to co-produce the film. I remember being so excited for this film back in high school because I had never seen an official Predator film in the theaters. A new rated R Predator film in 2010? It was my dream come true. 

It has now been four years since I first saw the film. And to be honest, I am shocked that this film is only four years old. Not only that, but everybody seems to have forgotten about this film. I haven't heard a single person mention this film to me in person or online in four years! This is surprising because Predators was both a financial success and well received by fans of the Predator series. What happened? It's as if this film fell off the planet for most people. I guess I am to blame as well because I am just now getting around to revisiting the film.

They should have called this film Humans vs. Predators. Just kidding. That joke sucks.

Predators opens as Royce (Adrien Brody) free falls from the sky into a jungle. When he awakes, he finds numerous other people around him. The group quickly puts together that they have been abducted and that they are all elite killers from various groups on Earth: the Mexican drug cartel, the F.B.I.'s most wanted, Russian Special Forces, etc. It's not long before the group discovers that the jungle they are in is not Earth at all, but a distant planet with an Earth-like jungle appearance. When the group is attacked by horned beasts, Royce deduces that they are being hunted. It's not long before the hunters, the Predators, reveal themselves and engage in a hunt to the death with the humans.

Predators is sort of a sequel and a reboot of the franchise at the same time. The film its smartly titled Predators in order to avoid the baggage of being called Predator 3 even though Predator 2 came out a whopping twenty years earlier. But that might be confusing because two AvP films came out before this film. So isn't it technically Predator 5? Regardless, Predators is an excellent title and a nice call back to James Cameron's choice to title the second Alien film Aliens since there is more than one extraterrestrial antagonist. 

Predators also introduces us to an entirely new cast of characters on a game preserve planet that we have never heard of before. Therefore, the film is trying to reboot the series while also carrying some continuity from the older films. Predator 2 is all but ignored as Predators countlessly homages and recalls Predator, even to the point of a character knowing about the events of Predator in Costa Rica in 1987. If the events of Predator are officially canon in this film, than I am going to assume that Predator 2 is also canon. Of course, they never bring up the events of the sequel but never disown it either.

Don't mess with these new super Predators.

Producer and writer Robert Rodriguez produced a very faithful sequel that revitalizes the franchise by bringing the events of the series back to the jungle that we loved so much from Predator. But this time, the Predators aren't going to Earth to hunt us anymore. The Predators are now abducting elite killers from Earth and transporting them to this game preserve planet. With the humans on their territory, the Predators can now hunt in packs and not have to worry about being on their own anymore.

The screen writers clearly love John McTiernan's original film. I don't blame the guys, who doesn't love that film? Therefore, the film packs a few references and homages to the original film in Predators. The score by John Debney sounds like an exact duplicate of Alan Silvestri's masterful Predator score. One of the human characters, a Russian named Nikolai, wields a heavy mini-gun that is clearly an homage to the mini-gun that Jesse Ventura's character uses in Predator. And during the film's finale, Adrien Brody takes off his shirt, wields a torch, and screams, "Kill me now! Come on! Do it!" These references are tied quite neatly into the film. Even though they aren't very subtle, at least they aren't painfully obvious and obnoxious either.

Much like the first two Predator films, Predators has a pretty expansive cast. While I commend the film for assembling a very impressive cast of well known contemporary actors (Adrien Brody, Alice Braga, Laurence Fishburne, Danny Trejo, Walter Goggins, Topher Grace, etc.), I can't say the same for the characters that they play and the dialog that they have to speak. Let's start with the good. Adrien Brody does a fine job as Royce, the muscular bad-ass leader of the group who will sacrifice anyone for his own survival. He's no Arnold, but he looks bad-ass when he shoots a gun and packs a good gravely voice. I also love Hanzo, the silent Yakuza gang member. He doesn't say much but is easily the most bad-ass of the all of the characters in the film. I also enjoyed how the bulk of the characters are either criminals or anti-heroes. This is a far stretch from your typical mercenary or police officer. 

"I'm the crazy one."

Unfortunately, many of the human characters are one noted or plain annoying. Edwin (Topher Grace) and Stans (Walter Goggins), my least favorite characters in the film, are a doctor and a criminal sentenced to death. Even though I like these two actors, their characters are given all of the humorous dialog and neither of them are ever funny. When Goggins spouts "humorous" lines like, "You're ass is so hot," I tune out. Their dialog and characterizations are just too forced and unnatural. 

One thing that I did not see coming the first time I saw this film was the nice little plot twist. Topher Grace's character, Edwin, is a doctor. Everyone else wonders how he ended up with the rest of the group since he isn't one of Earth's deadliest killers. But by the end of the film, Edwin's true intentions and reasons for being chosen are revealed in a nice twist that puts a spin on an otherwise formulaic genre picture.

Predators introduces several new ideas to the franchise in order to expand the mythology even more. In this film, there isn't just one type of Predator, but two. The three main Predators in the film are super Predators while the one hanging on a stone at the Predator camp is a classic Predator. The super Predators have faces that look far different from your typical Predator and hunt in packs of three. According to Noland (Laurence Fishburne), the super Predators have a dispute with the classic Predators. This is an interesting concept because we have never seen Predators fight with one another.

This leads into a pretty cool action scene near the end of the film where a classic Predator goes head to head with a super Predator. While the fight isn't incredible or anything special, the idea of two Predators duking it out is just too cool to hate on. It's essentially two guys in rubber suits bouncing off one another and firing lasers from their shoulder cannons. Fans of movies like Godzilla: Final Wars or Alien vs. Ninja might get a kick out of this.

A samurai duel in a Predator film? That's more like it.

All of the other action scenes in the film are pretty good too. My two favorite scenes are the ambush at the Predator camp and the sword fight between a Predator and Hanzo. The first fight at the Predator camp is filled with gun fire and laser blasting from both parties. It's an awesome scene and it definitely gives you exactly what you want from a Predator film. Hanzo also uses a katana in a sword fight against a Predator and its hand blade. The scene is even shot in a open field filled with grass. It's an awesome homage to the kind of samurai duel found in Harakiri or Sanjruo.

20th Century Fox recently announced that a new Predator sequel is in the works by none other than action maestro himself Shane Black (Lethal Weapon, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, The Last Boy Scout, Iron Man 3). Black is an excellent choice because he knows how to write a good action film and he even appeared in the original Predator. With Black both directing and writing, I think that the franchise is in good hands. However, I am curious if the new Predator film will follow the remaining characters left at the end of this film? Black stated that he wants to take advantage of the pre-existing mythology in the series (always a miracle to hear in today's reboot heavy world). I just don't understand why a sequel to Predators wasn't confirmed but a new Predator film devoid of details was. I guess we will have to wait and see.

A Predator holds up poor Nikolai.

Predators isn't as good as the first two Predator films but at least it's a huge step up from the lousy AvP films. The film is a nice reboot/sequel that reminds audiences why the Predators were so awesome in the first place. Predators has solid action scenes, good special effects, and great cinematography and jungle settings. The film is quite spooky in some scenes and even really gory too. Unfortunately, the film has some forgettable characters, a slow first act, and terribly cheesy dialog. If you can forgive that, I think that you owe it to yourself as an action fan to check out Predators, one of the better action/horror hybrids of recent years.

Rating: 7/10 - Much like Gareth Edwards' recent Godzilla reboot, Predators is a flawed but serviceable step in the right direction towards bringing a once dead franchise back to the big screen.

Franchise:
Predator (dir. John McTiernan, 1987)
Predator 2 (dir. Stephen Hopkins, 1990)
Predators (dir. Nimrod Antal, 2010)

AvP Spin-Offs:
Alien vs. Predator (dir. Paul W. S. Anderson, 2004)
Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem (dir. The Brothers Strause, 2007)