Review of The Hitman's Bodyguard (2017) by John M — 18 Aug 2017

Queue the Whitney Houston. Have you ever wondered who hitmen go to when they need protection? Well, they go to Ryan Reynolds, of course. Reynolds plays a character in a protection agency that specializes in keeping high value targets alive.

A hitman (Samuel L. Jackson) needs to testify in court, and even if these two weren't squabbling, survival would still be a challenge. Now this actually looked pretty decent, even though the time of the quirky hitmen being fresh has long since passed a couple of decades ago.

Adding to the résumé of what made this look promising is two very talented leads, so while I did miss this in theaters, I was sure to check it out as soon as I could on home market. That's probably the right place for this, because The Hitman's Bodyguard has highs and lows.

This is not a movie that you are watching for the story. To use words like "generic" and "stock" don't really paint the right picture, because you most definitely have seen action comedies like this before unless this is your first year of watching movies with an R rating.

It is filled with clichés including a very bland Bond villain as played by Gary Oldman who is there exclusively just to move the plot forward. No, the reason that you are watching this is for the chemistry between the two leads, which actually works extremely well.

They just are constantly giving each other a hard time, and when it is just Reynolds and Jackson onscreen, that is when this movie is at its strongest. It's even self-aware about its humor, addressing how much Samuel L.

Jackson drops MF bombs all over the place. I don't know how much of this is improvised and how much is written, but regardless, it doesn't matter. You can tell that they both had a great time making this movie, and that is infectious to the audience.

The script to this movie is just a template, but that's not something I am truly deducting points for. The most damning thing about this is that it is about twenty minutes too long. Because it is such a tried plot, there's no reason to include items like flushing out a forgettable villain, and there are plenty of parts to this that could have been left on the cutting room floor.

It makes it feel like it runs long, and it makes you just want to get back to these two characters trading insults. The Hitman's Bodyguard is a mixed bag, but it suffices as a mostly decent rental.