Wanted leaves little to be desired.
Posted on 18th July 2008 by antuan goodwin
I went to see Wanted the other night with the Missus. Overall, our impressions were positive. Any film that can make my girlfriend fist-pump the air when the ending credits roll is a good time in my book.
On one level, I was expecting eye candy, cool fight sequences and perhaps a cool catch phrase or two use when trying to sound cool in public. I really didn’t want to look past that. I really wanted to leave it at that, but anyone who has ever read one of my film reviews knows that better than to think that I would. (Spoilers Ahead.)
Wanted chronicles the rise of Wesley Gibson (James McAvoy), a meek 24-year-old who works in a cubicle, but is heir to a legacy of assassins. The interesting thing about Wanted is that, in the beginning, Wanted is very similar to movies such as Fight Club and Office Space in that it’s about dissatisfaction with a mundane and unfulfilling corporate job. However, when you look at the whole story Wanted is more like Star Wars or the Matrix in that it’s a fairly standard “zero-to-hero” type plot, where a nobody finds great power within and ends up saving the world from a great/hidden evil.
Story
This time around, our hero was taking charge of his life by escaping to the action-packed, freedom-filled world of professional killing by joining the Fraternity of Assassins. I was completely ready to accept this and move on, but then something strange happened.
A device known as the Loom of Fate is introduced. This grandiose weaving loom is used to determine the targets for assassination. Where most people just see a plot device, careful viewers see the loom as another system of control onto which Wesley latches. To me this means that Wesley transitions from one life he has no control over and into to another more interesting and fast paced life that he has no control over. This is all prefixed by a montage of Wesley being trained and methodically broken until he admits that he doesn’t know who he is. Again, what the casual viewer sees as a tough training regimen, I see as systematic brainwashing. Break them down and build them up in your image. Every pimp knows that.
Though our hero eventually breaks free of this system and ultimately takes control of his own life, I felt like there was tremendous potential to make this film into more than just this summer’s explodey action flick by exploring what it means to truly take control of one’s life. On the other hand, upon subsequent viewings I see that hints of these themes are present if one bothers to look beneath the surface. I suppose that if I wanted to see a super-preachy film about free will, I’d watch The Matrix: Revolutions or V for Vendetta.
Style and Inspiration
There’s lots of Fight Club inspired voice over and cool camera movements. As I said earlier, the plot is extremely reminicent of Star Wars, complete with it’s own spin on the classic “No… I am your father” moment of Empire Strikes Back. And then of course, everyone I know who’s seen Wanted has compared it to the Matrix. But at no point does this come across as a film that’s trying to copycat great films that have come before it. Wanted stands on it’s own as a genuinely entertaining movie.
It’s really good.
I can’t stress enough the value of knowing what a film’s goals are and judging it accordingly. Wanted is all about the spectacle and judged by that measure, it supremely delivers. There is huge action, epic car chases, explosions a-plenty… as an added bonus you get to see Morgan Freeman lose his cool near the end of the movie! It just so happens that they somehow managed to sneak a pretty good, albeit pretty standard, story into the deal. (Which is more than I can say about most action films these days.)
It’s not as good as Iron Man, which I’m using as the Gold Standard this year for action-fantasy films, but it is definitely worth your $10. Grab some popcorn and go see this film.
If you saw Wanted and liked it, you’ll probably also like Nightwatch and Daywatch by the same director (Timur Bekmambetov), as the offer similar levels of slick, high energy action.
