56 out of 56 people found the following review helpful:
Cracking stuff
aneurin from ,
7th December, 2007
When I went to see this there wasn’t a single woman in the cinema. To pinch a phrase, ‘Hitman – it’s not for girls’. With no exaggeration, this was 100 minutes of stylized violence interspersed with gratuitous nudity. Timothy Olyphant, liberated from the necessity to act, is rather good. While it would have been nice to make his character less likeable (I should not have found myself warming to an emotionless contract killer), this was not Olyphant’s fault, but almost certainly the studio’s. ‘Hitman’ knows it is an action film and thankfully never gets ideas above its station. Olyphant’s job is to kill people elaborately, his enemies are expected to die obediently and the girl is meant to get naked frequently. In fact, very frequently. And for no apparent reason. It is possible that Olga Kurylenko is a very good actress. It is also possible that she got the part because 1) she’s Russian 2) she’s a model 3) she was willing to undress on camera. Director Xavier Gens seems aware of the former possibility, and yet after a (no doubt lengthy) struggle with his action thriller conscience he decided to just let her parade round in a thong for the sake of it. The plot, predictably, is implausible. I cannot fathom why so much of it was shot in Russia, nor why Agent 47 was given Russian Orthodox affiliations. So far as I know (= according to Wikipedia) there is no precedent for either in the original videogame. Why this was introduced, why an action thriller spends such an inordinate amount of time in one country (very unBond, a clear influence throughout), only a tight budget can explain. Overall, this is exceedingly watchable. It could have been aimed just at the fans with a slew of subtle references that would have mystified the rest of us. Instead, it is an excellent action film in its own right, and while it (sadly) lacks the depth and intelligence of a truly great action film such as ‘Casino Royale’ (whose aesthetic it clearly emulates), this still ranks extremely high. Action films are above all about two things – irony value and getting the pulse racing. This does both.
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