I’ll confirm that I enjoy a B movie with the rest of the world. In fact, after reviewing the Likes of Hamnet and Sentimental Value, to name only 2 heavy duty recent cinemas, I relax most with Jason Statham’s frolics, recently Shelter. By ramping up the emotional level, he elevates the screenplay while still easily dispatching several opponents.
Michael Mason (Statham), hiding out on a Scottish island, rescues a young girl, Jessie (Bodhi Rae Breathnach) from a storm but reveals his true assassin identity to authorities when he has to go ashore to get medicine for her broken ankle. Most of the story involves protecting her and himself from corrupt MI6 operatives and lavishing love on his dog, Jack, and, not surprisingly, Jessie herself.
She is an outstanding actress while Jason is more taciturn than Charles Bronson but displaying more inner emotion like love than Charlie ever dredged up except for the children in The Magnificent Seven. Here Mason seems sincerely to love Jessie and is willing to die for her if necessary.
The UK is lovingly photographed and minor characters like Bill Nighy’s bad boy Manafort are well cast. But the dog and the girl are to die for, yet that’s not possible because Statham knows his B movies with many more, I hope, to come. Shelter is plain good thriller with an unusual measure of emotion—it’s what movies do.
Shelter
Director: Ric Roman Waugh (Angel Has Fallen, Greenland)
Screenplay: Ward Perry (The Shattering)
Cast: Jason Statham (The Beekeeper, A Working Man))
Rating: R
Length: 1h 47m
John DeSando, a Los Angeles Press Club first-place winner for National Entertainment Journalism, hosts NPR’s It’s Movie Time and Cinema Classics as well as podcasts Back Talk and Double Take (recently listed by Feedspot as two of the ten best NPR Movie Podcasts) out of WCBE 90.5 FM, Columbus, Ohio.Contact him at JohnDeSando52@gmail.com