Home Media Catch Up - Hitman: Agent 47 (2015)

Director: Aleksander Bach

Cast: Rupert Friend, Zachary Quinto, Hannah Ware, Ciaran Hinds, Angelbaby

Country: United Kingdom / Germany / United States

Rating: R

Run Time: 96 min

Home Media Catch Up is a series dedicated to reviewing films released within the same year or prior year that I either missed upon theatrical release or have not got around to viewing on home media yet. Therefore, they won't contain the historical depth of a Retrospective Review, nor the initial reaction of a Theatrical Review, but more so something in between.

When I recently made my Top Five Best (And Worst) Action Films of the Year List, I mentioned that several films did not appear on my list because I never got around to seeing them. As with most years, I tend to play catch up with my 'to watch list' and end up checking out several films on home video. While it is always great whenever you unearth an undiscovered treasure from the previous year, such as Bone Tomahawk, it is also painful whenever you watch a turd that you should have avoided in the first place, such as Hitman: Agent 47.

After 2007's Hitman, which was honestly a mild success, 20th Century Fox decided to give the I.P. a second chance with a new reboot. Although the reboot received far worse reviews and made a tad less than its predecessor, Hitman: Agent 47 was still a minor success considering its R rating. Critics were particularly harsh with this one though, trashing it so much to the point where the film received an embarrassing 8% on Rotten Tomatoes. Let's be clear: Hitman: Agent 47 is not a good film. However, it does not deserve a rancid score as low as that. Those critics must have not see such direct to video filth as Ernie Barbarash's Pound of Flesh or Wych Kaosayananda's Zero Tolerance, as those action films were far worse in every way imaginable. Therefore, let it be known that Hitman: Agent 47 is not garbage, although don't expect me to defend the film in public.

The first of many kills.

Adapted from the video game series of the same name, Hitman: Agent 47 tells the story of Katia van Dees (Hannah Ware), a woman with strange abilities in search of her past and father. It turns out that her father, Dr. Litvenko (Ciaran Hinds), created the Agent Program, a program that brainwashed new borns into emotionless yet perfect super assassins for the International Contracts Agency. One of those assassins, Agent 47 (Rupert Friend), is in search of Katia because she can lead him to her father. However, 47's mission is complicated when Brian (Zachary Quinto), a member of the Syndicate, repeatedly intervenes. Once 47 gets ahold of Tatia, he explains to her the origin of her powers and that she was a part of the same program as him. The two team up in search of Dr. Litvenko, all the while taking on the Syndicate's agents.

Hitman: Agent 47 is yet another bland and dour adaptation of a video game series that once again proves that video games with weak stories should not be adapted to the big screen. It's almost funny how there has yet to be a single critically acclaimed or beloved video game to film adaptation in the last thirty years, but it's true. The last time that I personally tackled a video game to film adaptation on the blog was John Moore's Max Payne, a film with many the same problems as Hitman: Agent 47. To be honest, I personally love both of those game series, as each features stylish action and notable lead protagonists who operate as fun vessels for the player to inhabit a violent world with. Unfortunately, all of their feature film adaptations pale in comparison to the video games, or at least barely represent the games at heart.

I believe it is important that I attempt to tackle the age old question within this review: Why has nobody been able to create a solid video game to film adaptation so far? For the most part, many video games don't have particularly great stories. They tend to be made better by their interactivity and playability, after all, they are called "video games" for a reason. Both the Max Payne and Hitman game series are essentially glorified shooting galleries in disguise as a game with a story. Therefore, filmmakers have the uphill struggle of crafting a film out of something that doesn't have a fleshed out story in the first place (also see: The Super Mario Bros. Movie, Mortal Kombat). It makes one wonder why filmmakers don't attempt to adapt modern video game series such as the immensely mythological and layered Halo and Bioshock series. Until filmmakers can either a) choose a video game source with a layered story, or b) create their own layered story instead of relying purely upon spectacle, video game to film adaptations are always going to fail.

"We just met an hour ago, you trust me, right?"

Although Rupert Friend portrays the titular hitman, he pales in comparison to the character's previous player, Timothy Olyphant (Live Free or Die Hard). Olyphant possessed a magnitude and gravitas in Hitman that Friend lacks entirely here within the reboot. Whether the film's direction or Friend's lack of leading experience is to blame, he makes for a particularly forgettable Agent 47. In fact, the reboot was originally supposed to star Paul Walker of the Fast and Furious series before his untimely fast and furious death in 2014. It would have been interesting to see a boy scout actor of Walker's pedigree portray such a dark and emotionless character as Agent 47. Plus, the film would have most likely been more successful and launched a franchise considering Walker's stardom and likability. However, if this was the script that Walker had to work with, than even he could not have saved the film that much.

One of the film's biggest problems, which is entirely attributable to its horrendous script, is that the titular Hitman himself is reduced to a supporting player in his own movie. Instead, the character of Tatia, portrayed by Hannah Ware, is truly the protagonist of the film, as the film is more or less her story. Even though 47 gets involved in her story, the film never becomes about him and instead uses him as an unstoppable killing machine and mentor to Tatia's apprentice. The only other notable supporting player in the film, besides 47, is the villainous Brian, portrayed by Zachary Quinto of Star Trek fame. His character possesses a metallic endoskeleton, thereby making him impervious to 47's bullets. Brian is truly the biggest joke of the film, as he is more or less a rip off of the Universal Soldiers found within the Universal Soldier series, which was more or less a rip off of the Terminator cyborgs found within the Terminator series. Although without him, the film would have been far less watchable. He may be a joke, but at least Brian makes for a fun and watchable right hand man.

The majority of Hitman: Agent 47's problems lies within its script and screen story written by Skip Woods, a screenwriter who specializes in ruining great characters with his awful screenplays (see: X-Men Origins: Wolverine, A Good Day to Die Hard). The story is a complete mess, as the movie gives you the littlest of exposition possible to base a plot around in order for everything to appear confusing all of the time so that the film can slowly reveal things to make it seem clever or twisting. Woods crafts an artificial sense of discovery within his script, as the viewer discovers key character motivations and plot points towards the end of the film that most other films would give you up front. Not only that, but every single conversation is purely about explaining mechanizations of the plot and nothing else. Imagine a film where no character speaks like a human being, but instead a robot, and you have Hitman: Agent 47, a film that features one emotionless assassin and a mechanized cyborg-like villain already!

This is basically as bad ass and exciting as the film gets: double gun posing.

Thankfully, Hitman: Agent 47 is rated R, its one saving grace. Although far from great or visibly comprehensible, the bloody action set pieces are the only reason to check out this video game to film adaptation. A sad truth is that the film's action peaks in its opening scene in which 47 lays waste to a group of armed guards in the film's most grounded and exciting action set piece of the entire picture. David Leitch (John Wick) is credited with some of the action choreography and additional action found within the film. Although I cannot confirm what portions of the film have his stamp on them, I'd bet that the film's more gun fu-centric sequences, such as the opening shootout, belong to him.

Unfortunately, the film is plagued by numerous computer generated moments that cover up the film's non-existent practical stunt work or bloody squibs. Lame CG centric moments, such as a plane engine sucking in agents or digital agents sliding down ropes while shooting, reveal a small scaled/mid budget film with desperate blockbuster ambition. Coupled with its numerous foreign locations, Hitman: Agent 47 sacrifices practicality and reason for maximum international appeal.

While the film's plentiful gun fights make for the film's only enjoyable action mayhem, every physical bout is particularly awful due to the film's weak cinematography. The shaky photography and rapid editing, the bane of contemporary action, is due to the inability of the film's performers to enact believable action. It also doesn't help that the film features not one, not two, but three physical fights between 47 and Brian, portrayed by two physically inept actors, Friend and Quinto. Therefore, their fights come out the worst due to their lack of physical experience. Fortunately for them, but unfortunate for the viewer, director Aleksander Bach covers up their lack of skills with as much shaky cam as possible.

That's it, throw on the smolder.

As to how a film could be titled Hitman: Agent 47, and not reveal its titular character's reasons for his actions throughout the entire film until the final scene, boggles my mind. Coupled with the absolutely embarrassing final shot of the film in which Agent 48, an exact replica of Agent 47, shows up to take on him and Tatia, reveals a film that absolutely crumbles a part in in its final moments. Hitman: Agent 47 is an amateur affair, with amateur fights, amateur computer generated action, and amateur story telling abounding from start to finish. Besides some sleek gun fu action and a decent score by composer Marco Beltrami, this reboot of Square Enix's famed game series doesn't offer up much. It's not a train wreck, but pretty close to derailing off of its track and crashing and burning into the dirt where its script was found.

Rating: 4/10 - Ultimately a bland studio actioner with decent action set pieces, immensely bland characters, and a horrendous script.

Max Payne: Unrated Cut (2008)

Director: John Moore

Cast: Mark Wahlberg, Mila Kunis, Beau Bridges, Ludacris, Chris O' Donnell, Donald Louge

Country: Canada / United States

Rating: Unrated

Run Time: 103 minutes

Why can't a video game be adapted to the silver screen successfully? For the last 25 years, there have been numerous video game to film adaptations and each and everyone has been either flawed, decent, or terrible. In 2008, we got a film adaptation of one of my personal favorite video game series, Max Payne. Max Payne is a video game seeped in film noir aesthetics that follows Detective Max Payne as he tries to uncover why his wife and child were murdered. The series was notable for its character narration, high body count, and bullet time effects. The game screamed for an action packed film adaptation for goodness sakes. How does Max Payne stack up in the flawed video game to film adaptation world? Read on...

Mark Wahlberg takes a snapchat during an action scene.

Max Payne (Mark Wahlberg) is a detective who seeks the one responsible for the death of his wife and new born. As Max investigates, he discovers a new drug whose dangerous side effects are causing its users to act irrationally. However, Max soon finds that the drug's creators are linked to the death of his wife and that his allies may not be who they say they are.

John Moore's adaptation of Max Payne proved to me that some video games should simply remain a video game. The Max Payne game has very little story to it in the first place. This is explains why it is a video game. Because the story isn't that expansive, we get to play a bunch of shootouts in between each dramatic revelation. And that is fine to me. Max Payne was a just a video game and it had no other duty than to simply engage me with a decent story and some fun gameplay.

However, the film decides to take this murder mystery story and stretch it out beyond belief. There is not a major action sequence for a whopping hour! Sure there are small beats of violence here and there. But this is a Max Payne movie! This is a movie based on a game where one guy slaughters hundreds of people and we have to wait one hour before we even start to see something like it. By the time the film gets to the action, you won't care about the characters or the story anymore.

Max aims left yet nails a wall dead on.

Mark Wahlberg makes for a bland Max Payne. While he looks the part, Wahlberg sucks all of the life out of the character and reduces him to a brooding widow. In the video game, Max is also a brooding widow, but you get the sense that he is also very snarky and likable. It also would have helped if the film only focused on Max and his narration instead of jumping around amongst all of the supporting characters in the film.

This brings me to another issue I have with the film: the entire supporting cast. Man, what a bore. Every supporting character purely exists for the plot and all disappear within scenes. If you took away each character's profession, I could not tell you a single thing about their personality or characteristics. As I said before, the film would have been stronger if it chose to strictly focus on Max and give smaller amounts of screen time to the supporting players. It would be too exhausting to list all of the characters and the actors that play them too. Just wiki it guys.

I do want to single out one of the film's main villains, Lupino (Amaury Nolasco). Lupino is set up from the beginning of the film as being the leader of the druggies. We even get to watch a video tape that explains that he was once a soldier and that a new street drug has made him nearly invincible. In other words, we as an audience know that this character means business and we can't wait to see him square off against the protagonist. By the time Lupino and Max finally square off, they have the world's shortest fight scene and it must clock in at twenty seconds. What a showdown.

John Moore's "Money Shot"

However, I did not entirely dislike the film. From a visual stand point, this is a very beautiful looking action film. The night time scenes are especially notable. The dark lit sky and soft snow make for some beautiful shots. If anything, Max Payne visually screams Neo-Noir even if it can't be a good Neo-Noir.

As I stated before, the film saves all of its action for the final forty minutes. The first big shootout takes place in a office space between Max and a SWAT team. This action scene alone explains why I own this film on Blu Ray. The sound design and editing during this sequence is incredible. There is a great slow motion shot of Max running along side breaking glass windows as he blind fires his gun toward the SWAT officers. One of his bullets nails an officer in the leg and sends him flying into a glass table. Max than aims his gun at the door in front of him and fires away into it. He than leaps through the air and continues to shoot flying through the door and out of the room! Phew, what a rush.

There is also the infamous high speed shot of Max leaping backwards with his shotgun. This scene was shot with high speed cameras and it definitely shows. However, there are two glaring errors in this scene that really spoil its impact on me. The first is that Max never chambers his shotgun up again. Therefore, how is his shotgun still firing? The second concerns the henchman firing at Max from up on a ledge. The henchman aims at Max yet his bullets nail vials of drugs on the other side of the room. It makes for a great slow motion visual, but why is the henchman firing so far away from Max when he is literally right down in front of him? What could've been a memorable scene is plagued by two ridiculous logical errors.

Max does his best Chow Yun impression.

It is also extremely important to mention that I watched the unrated cut of this film and not the theatrical cut. The theatrical cut was PG-13 and had not an ounce of blood. Therefore, you must own the unrated cut in order to enjoy this film. All of the digital blood is restored in all of its gorey glory. 

In conclusion, Max Payne is a mediocre action film. Even though it takes an hour to get to the action, you won't care about the characters or story by the time you get to it. I really wish this film was a hit because it could have warranted sequels and more action packed adventures with Max. I really do love the visual style of the film and the office space shootout is one of the great underrated shootouts of the last decade. Unfortunately, Max Payne the film is a real bore. Moral of the story? Stick to the video games.

Rating: 6/10 - A slow and boring hour long climb up to the top of an action packed hill makes me recommend Max Payne as merely a rental. If you can find the film for $1, than go for it.