Thursday, July 28, 2011

In Statham We Trust

The Mechanic (spoilers, though if you really care you are a fool)





      Statham is not happy being near steps. Or decking.

A bad man is driven home by some goons. His goons are mean to poor people on the way. At home he goes for a swim. His many guards do not see Jason Statham in the pool. Statham kills the bad man, then escapes. Statham gets angry at CLOTHES. Statham pays for sleeping men to look after his boat with LIQOR.
Statham meets a sexy young lady who is happy to see him scowl when he arrives at some 30s style speakeasy bar. Statham has sex with her looking ANGRY. Statham has NEVER told her his name.
Statham meets a friend, his only friend Donald Sutherland, in a cheap diner. Statham looks angry at the very IDEA of diners. Statham’s boss sends him a message that next he needs to kill his friend. Statham looks angry. His friend sends him a private jet so he can tell him to kill his friend in person. Statham looks angry. Statham kills his friend. Statham meets his friend’s wayward son at the otherwise deserted funeral. The son looks like a fool compared to the MANLY Statham.
The son is played by Ben Foster. Ben Foster looks like the older brother of Screech from Saved by the Bell. They did not NEED to cast Ben Foster in this role to make Statham look manly. Statham would look manly next to THE ROCK.
Although Statham is a hard man, he does feel SOME guilt for killing his friend. This is because he is COMPLEX.
The son acts stupid because of what he thinks happened to his dad. Statham killed him to make it look like carjackers. Statham stops the son from making a big mistake. The son wants Statham to teach him how to be within SNIFFING distance of his manliness.
Statham makes the son look after an emasculating dog.
Statham KILLS a man because he doesn’t like his slovenly appearance, and makes it look like a porn related ACCIDENT.
Statham sets up the son on his first hit because he looks like queer bait. The son doesn’t follow orders about how to take out his mark. The son DOES NOT know best.
Statham does. The son wins but only after a bad beating. Statham obviously only keeps him around begrudgingly, because he is COMPLEX.
Statham and the son climb a skyscraper to plan a fat man’s death. The fat man is a baddie because he doesn’t tell jokes. He may have also killed an innocent girl and greedily built a new age empire whilst being a junky, but mainly he’s bad because he’s FAT and NOT FUNNY.
After the fat man and MANY of his henchmen are dead, Statham finds out the boss LIED about his friend.
After dispatching a double-crosser on an empty BUS, Statham kills other, lesser hard men who have killed his LIQOR DRINKING BOAT MINDER. The son does a good job of taking out similar bad guys at Statham’s house. The boss means to kill them!
The son realises who killed his dad. Statham tells him “There is no peace”.
Statham goes after the boss. The boss says “He’s in the building get me the fuck out of here!”.
The boss leaves his building in a convoy but is not safe, as Statham and the son have big guns, a bus and a garbage truck.
Statham wins.
BUT. The son enacts revenge. listens to his music. Drives his car. Can Statham have lost. NO.

On July 28th, 2011, Funny or Die posted a video of a spoof charity appeal for Netflix users featuring a man in tears at the prospect of not being able to watch all of Statham’s films in which he portrays a hitman. This was also the day I happened to choose to watch the Mechanic.

As action film’s go, it’s average. As Statham’s films go, it’s average, achieving neither the kinetic thrills of the Transporter series nor the sheer lunacy of the Crank films. It’s an also-ran and it’s hard to see how it ascended from it’s straight-to-retail/rental feel to a cinema release, but then maybe that’s because Statham’s the MAN.