Headshots, headshots, and more headshots! The first scene in Wanted started off with a bang; literally, with a professional assassin taking out a dozen of other amateur assassins sent to kill him. The movie at this point transits to slow-motion, as if to let viewers enjoy the sensation of bullets going through people’s heads. The professional assassin eventually gets taken out himself; headshot of course, by an exaggerating long distance sniper placed miles away. That pretty much sets the tone for the action-packed and brutal movie.
Based on a comic miniseries written by Mark Millar and J.G. Jones, Wanted aims to rock the theatres by starring a strong cast of actors like Angelina Jolie, Morgan Freeman, and James McAvoy, a 29 year old Scottish actor who has been nominated for the Golden Globe for “Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture”. Timur Bekmambetov, a Russian-Kazakh film director known for vampire franchise Nochnoy dozor and Dnevnoy dozor, was handed the important role of delivering the final product.
The second scene of the movie finally introduces the main character, Wesley Gibson (McAvoy), an office worker suffering under his domineering boss and constantly ignored by his girlfriend whom he knew was having an affair with his best friend. For the whole of his life, he had been living under the shadows of others, never daring to push for a change, until he met Fox (Angelina Jolie). Fox was a member in a century-old fraternity of assassins headed by Sloan (Morgan Freeman), a mysterious leader who appears in short but significant moments of the movie to induce changes such as when he convinced Wesley to join the fraternity to take revenge against Cross. His life took a dramatic change after joining the fraternity in which he went through a tormenting training process to become an assassin. “Brutality” was the only thing to describe the training as Wesley suffered random bashing and slashing, reminding me of movies such as the Saw series where victims suffered sadistic treatments.
The movie details how a typical “loser” was transformed into a killing machine as Wesley slowly works towards finding not only his true self, but also unravel the dirty secrets and plots of the people around him.
Wanted is an action-packed movie which at times seemed too much like a carbon copy to The Matrix. A distinct point however, which sets Wanted apart from other movies, was their introduction of the curve bullet which bended fiercely in its flight towards its targets. Overall, the cast were subtle in their depiction and each character of the movie was brought out well. My favorite had to be Fox (Angelina Jolie) as she was depicted as a cold blooded assassin who yet at times, showcased a different and gentle side of herself. In a film where almost everyone is a protagonist and cold-blooded assassin, she was the representation of justice, especially in the final scenes. This individual performance itself by Angelina Jolie makes it a movie well-worth watching.
By Yeong Guo Hong
