Review of The Hitman's Bodyguard (2017) by Nathan A — 12 Aug 2017

It's a rare occasion for a paired-up genre to offer something different rather than going towards the usual, general direction that goes through the recycling process time and time again while twisting the tropes. An action comedy as the current case gives laughter and adrenaline as a package deal to a moviegoing experience. Representing the current case this year is "The Hitman's Bodyguard", and it delivers satire in both bantering dynamics and timely fun political tease, with fast-yet-choppily-paced action that punches good, and hilarity as expected.

Special protection agent Michael Bryce has been tasked to protect the life of his mortal enemy Darius Kincaid, who've interfered into Bryce's career from time to time in the past as one of the world's most notorious hitmen. Into Bryce's task over Kincaid, he has to make sure that Kincaid gets transported safe from United Kingdom to the International Court of Justice to testify. With the upcoming trial, Kincaid gets targeted by the deadly assassins by a merciless Eastern European dictator, which forced the two men to work together and survive through chases till trial.

The dynamic between Reynolds's fast-talking charisma and Jackson's tough, non-serious attitude is what sold the movie, and it exceeds expectations on how hilarious it turned out. They both performed well when dressed like men with a plan at the start along further the comical line - with a nice touch of Jackson's song in the end credits that couldn't be helped but find amusing. They're the pinnacle that infected their co-actresses Èlodie Yung and Salma Hayek to perform at the same level in their screen time. The respective failed and strained romances in the characterization showed nice motivation with the aforementioned satire being amusing when connected.

While on performances, Gary Oldman's character is a replicate of Christoph Waltz's character in Quentin Taratino's "Inglourious Bastards", but with a different spin that's probably topical. The position of his role being a merciless Eastern European dictator trying to keep Kincaid silent coincided, unknown directly at that, in today's clashing of politics and the other end of a certain probe. When watching how it all unfolds for the character from beginning to the unexpected turn in the climax, it couldn't be helped but feel that the course was political satire based on ending presumptions.

How action-packed the film punched in is enough to make you feel the adrenaline and possibly the impacts. What made that possible is also a conflicting flaw when the delivery is too fast that makes it choppy editing in the cinematography, like Reynolds' other film "Safe House" in 2012 as an example of choppy editing. It may seem too much in the motion, but it's still retained the coherent execution when an action bit occurs. As that's the main flaw that could be a problem to some or most if they can't handle it at a small extent, next to the accusation of the recycling process via storyline and structure, it proved to be effective for presenting the action.

"The Hitman's Bodyguard" delivers both crowd-pleasing effective action and clever, cemented (unforgettable) comedy as a better offer for the year 2017, outside the tops being the superhero genre and the overwhelming "Fate of the Furious". As seen in the previews, the Reynolds-Jackson narratively-reluctant team-up dynamic is the main attraction and main source of hilarity, while being fun as "Beverly Hills Cop" that came to mind. Speaking of which with the other film being mentioned, Samuel L. Jackson's occasional laugh is equivalent to Eddie Murphy's cues of laughter. (B+).