Film Review: Mechanic: Resurrection

"You Have 36 Hours..."

Who doesn't love The Stath? An actor who knows his strengths as well as his limits and makes the big bucks by doing what he does best year in, year out; meaty action movies. Although the 2011 version of The Mechanic was a reboot/remake/re-imagining of 1972 Charles Bronson thriller itself, its' relative success didn't exactly warrant that of a sequel in any shape or form yet here we are, with Mechanic: Resurrection being an A-Z in the blueprint of Jason Statham movies; little plot yet a hell lot of action. Supported by a rather starry cast with Jessica Alba, Michelle Yeoh and Tommy Lee Jones all fighting for screen time, Mechanic Resurrection is pretty much everything you would expect from an end of summer action flick starring The Stath, with Resurrection going in one ear and heading swiftly out the other without preaching anything other than adrenaline-fuelled mayhem.

Where the first Mechanic attempted to delve a bit deeper into the ambiguous livelihood of Jason Statham's Arthur Bishop, the titular "Mechanic", a hired gun who articulately kills people in ways that makes their deaths appear like accidents, Resurrection simply wants to kill as many people as possible, dropping in the idea of a plot as background for Bishop to shoot, punch, stab, blow up and eradicate as many hired goons as possible without ever leaving a scratch on his silky bald head. Although strictly not a comedy, the sight of endless waves of bodyguards being swiftly culled in the most violent ways possible did manage to produce a few fits of laughter, and although the film is incredibly violent, it never stops long enough to dwell on such as well as not having the chance to be regarded as lazy and offensive as something such as London Has Fallen. Yes, both films are ridiculously stupid and so lacking in plot it would make first year media students cry in fear, the truth is Resurrection is just plain dumb fun, something of which we can all do with sometime. 

Overall Score: 5/10

Sin City: A Dame To Kill For - Quicky Review - SPOILERS

9 years after the original, Frank Miller returns with "Sin City: A Dame To Kill For". Based loosely on the past events, A Dame to Kill for is something of a muddle. Both a prequel and a sequel to the original, this time around we focus on a few characters that we had previously met and a couple new ones to mix it up a little. Being that the movie jumps from past to present, following the general plot would normally be quite the task for many other movies to pull off. Much like the first instalment, it jumps around a lot between characters with no conceivable connection, which I can only assume is to mimic the way comic book series work from time to time. The problem here is that we never saw the host of characters meet/interact in the first one but now we actually do. Although the only connection made is to the muscle "Marv" for some help killing people or beating the utter shite out of them. Although it was fun, connections between characters like Dwight or Johnny and Nancy would have given the movie a flow that was far less jarring and added a layer of character development that could have been extremely fun had it been done in the right way.

Now for a story, I don't quite know how to describe it. Marv just goes around doing what he did in the first, just this time his plot wasn't driven by Goldie's death but more for the hell of it. Johnny is a gambler who has some sort of ability to win everything he does causing problem between him and the senator. On the topic of Senator Roark, Nancy is doing her stripper thing but aided by an alcohol addiction and crippling depression after the death of Hartigan. With the aim to kill the senator, we follow her through a dark process of gaining the courage to act upon her desires. Finally we have Dwight. Originally played by Clive Owen the role has now been filled by Josh Brolin who is being screwed about by Ava (Eva Green) and her lackie - previously played by Michael Clarke Duncan - Manute without the golden eye. Dwight's story is probably the most in depth story from the group and one of the better acted.

Having only watched the original the day before, I wasn't sure how everything would have panned out. For acting, I was expecting something a little more engaging and realistic. Other than going with cheesy one-liners or short quotes like a comic book, I wanted something plausible for this new instalment. Those who really achieved it were Joseph Gordan-Levitt and Josh Brolin. Taking over from Clive Owen isn't a hard job for anyone by Brolin makes the character his own. For all the characters, they had to act like they had come straight from the comic and its rather disjointing when watching Miho jump about killing people as she is frozen in position but the background is travelling and it looks rather corny and honestly terrible. Although Levitt's character was more of a waste of time for those who haven't involved themselves with the comics, he was an interesting character to watch nonetheless. His story arch did little to impact the story of all the characters apart from the Senator but he was enjoyable to follow.

Considering everything I've picked out, the movie was very enjoyable. The acting isn't always great and constantly being barraged with nude/sex scenes is rather painful and often unnecessary but the general flow of the movie was entertaining. Does it make me want to read the comics? I'm still not quite sure. I may invest some time into the first to see how well it goes down but I'm sceptical of the potential. So for an overall experience, you're going to have to watch the first to even understand this appearance but I think it deserves a 6/10, potentially a 7 if it grows on me at some point.