Aleksander Bach
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This is another case of a movie with so many other elements and references to other movies (The Terminator, The Matrix, John Wick) that there’s no room for the film to make its own identity.
The movie borrows heavily from The Terminator in that a character named John Smith (don’t trust anyone with that name!) seems to be charged with saving the heroine from the Hitman who wants to wipe her out.
In fact, the first 20 minutes (or so) work as an homage to The Terminator , with the seemingly indestructible 47 carving a swath of death and destruction to get to Katia and John.
Consequently, its tale often feels like some sort of new-world reimagining of The Terminator, with Agent 47 as the mecha-killer and Katia as the Linda Hamilton-esque badass who must struggle to understand her circumstances (laughable hint: her full name, Katia van Dees, is “90” in French) while teaching her preprogrammed compatriot to be less of an inhuman monster and more of a kindler, gentler killing machine.
The movie tries to pull off the transition from The Terminator to Terminator 2 in a single film, by positioning Agent 47 as a force of malevolence before teaming him up with Katia, whereupon he becomes a force of, if not exactly good, then perhaps a sort of neutrality.
It’s basically The Terminator, if the plot was a baffling mess, none of the human characters were even remotely interesting, the heroes and villains switched allegiances constantly for no reason, and the entire script sounded like it was cut and pasted from a list of the most clichéd lines of dialogue in Hollywood history.
Resident Evil (2002)
Directed by Paul W. S. Anderson
influenced Hitman: Agent 47 (2015)
Plot Visuals Themes
Le Clerq is intent on creating an army of super-killers because, well, he’s a bad guy, and that’s what bad guys do—just as Hitman: Agent 47, which also comes around to mimicking the Resident Evil franchise, clumsily apes from better movies because it’s a lousy one, and that’s what lousy ones do.
One strobe-lit massacre looks a joyless imitation of John Wick ; other moments briefly recall the Resident Evil series and The Wolverine .
If The Bourne Identity and Resident Evil hooked up back in 2002, this is the baby that one of them would bring to the doorstep of the other, begging them to take it.
Say what you will about the overall quality of the “ Resident Evil ” films, but they at least had personality now and then, which is what every frame of this film is lacking.
Even the “Mission: Impossible” movies were good at wrapping things up, even as they teased what might happen next, but Hitman does this in a way where it’s obvious the story isn’t over and that feels like a rip-off since who knows if and when there will be another movie?
Katia is also pursued by other men from an organization called the Syndicate (not to be confused with the group Ethan Hunt pursues in the most recent Mission: Impossible ), because they are also looking for this mystery man, who can unlock the secrets of the genetic engineering that created Agent 47 and his ilk in the first place.
Borrowing from everything like Terminator to Mission: Impossible to Bourne and even a similar plot element from another opening this week, American Ultra, this edition of the hoped-for 20th Century Fox franchise doesn’t offer many compelling reasons to see it, rather than play it.
Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
Directed by James Cameron
influenced Hitman: Agent 47 (2015)
Themes Characters
And at its core, the story does express a modicum of curiosity about whether a government-funded killing machine could retain his conscience — a question that nods briefly in the direction of “Terminator 2: Judgment Day,” with its incomparably poignant man-or-machine riddles.
The movie tries to pull off the transition from The Terminator to Terminator 2 in a single film, by positioning Agent 47 as a force of malevolence before teaming him up with Katia, whereupon he becomes a force of, if not exactly good, then perhaps a sort of neutrality.
The titular hitman, Agent 47 (Friend), starts out as Arnold Schwarzenegger's deadly T-800 from the first Terminator before revealing himself to be the mentor figure that cyborg became in T2.
This is another case of a movie with so many other elements and references to other movies (The Terminator, The Matrix, John Wick) that there’s no room for the film to make its own identity.
One strobe-lit massacre looks a joyless imitation of John Wick ; other moments briefly recall the Resident Evil series and The Wolverine .
The fight sequences and shootouts, overseen by John Wick filmmakers Chad Stahelski and David Leitch, are certainly competent, but they’re also painfully repetitive; there’s only so many mild thrills one can wring from the sight of Friend passively slaughtering generic goons.
And then there’s who’s choreographed them: Chad Stahelski and David Leitch, journeymen in the art who last year cashed in their chips to make “John Wick” themselves.
It's bad enough that Hitman: Agent 47—the second big-screen adaptation of the popular Hitman video-game series after the by-now-long-forgotten Xavier Gens film from 2007—just barely satisfies in the action-spectacle department, what with its chintzy-looking CGI explosions and blood splattering, and a flashy editing style that comes dangerously close to making a hash out of the rather impressive stunt choreography (courtesy of John Wick directors Chad Stahelski and David Leitch).
When the action does kick-in, fans do get the sort of John Wick-style “Gun Fu” that is satisfying on a visceral (and totally fantastical) level.
Friend’s bland chrome-dome antihero dispatches hordes of enemies by twirling about while firing two steely pistols at once like some sort of third-rate Chow Yun-fat circa The Killer and Hard Boiled.
Friend’s bland chrome-dome antihero dispatches hordes of enemies by twirling about while firing two steely pistols at once like some sort of third-rate Chow Yun-fat circa The Killer and Hard Boiled.
This is another case of a movie with so many other elements and references to other movies (The Terminator, The Matrix, John Wick) that there’s no room for the film to make its own identity.
Before the credits, the video game iteration of Agent 47 has been obliterated, as Rupert Friend ’s title character whirls and spins like Neo at the end of “ The Matrix ,” eliminating enemies incapable of pointing and shooting their guns in a logical amount of time.
Fingers are firmly crossed for Duncan Jones’s forthcoming Warcraft , but in the meantime this big-screen reboot of the Hitman series merely reminds us that in this genre Mortal Kombat and Silent Hill remain unremarkable high-water marks.
If The Bourne Identity and Resident Evil hooked up back in 2002, this is the baby that one of them would bring to the doorstep of the other, begging them to take it.
Las imponentes ciudades industriales de Alemania y Singapur son capturadas con precisión por el cinefotógrafo Óttar Guðnason (Inhale, 2010); pero la seducción de los escenarios contrasta enormemente con el bajo nivel de los actores, en particular Hannah Ware, la responsable de ser el eje emocional del filme se percibe como otro más de los Agentes: sin emociones.
Fingers are firmly crossed for Duncan Jones’s forthcoming Warcraft , but in the meantime this big-screen reboot of the Hitman series merely reminds us that in this genre Mortal Kombat and Silent Hill remain unremarkable high-water marks.
Fox is surely hoping that “surprise box office hit” might be a plausible alternative, though the best one will likely be able to say on that front is that where disastrous franchise relaunches are concerned, it’s no “Fantastic Four.”
For all of the rumors of Fantastic Four being an underdeveloped, over-edited film with a moody overtone forced upon it, I wouldn't be surprised if whoever was responsible for the horrible changes to that film got their hands on Hitman: Agent 47 and went to town.
A violently stylish Euro-thriller that serves up the architectural wonders of Berlin and Singapore in its exteriors, and Zachary Quinto battling Rupert Friend in its interiors, it’s like every other killer-in-a-black-suit since “Pulp Fiction.”