Another fun thriller from a director who likes working with the stylish Jason Statham.
“I’m beginning to think he’s a psychopath.”
So says one of the bad boys in Guy Ritchie’s Wrath of Man about super operative, “the limey” H (Jason Statham). Well, you could say the same for the famously taciturn actor, Statham, who is an expert at kickboxing and jiujitsu in real life. Except that in Wrath he uses a gun.
“The dark horse” H rarely cracks a smile but here brings a slight grin when he kills six robbers while he’s on a run to guard cash for an armored car company called Fortico. One of the successful outcomes of this otherwise standard heist film is Ritchie’s ability to weave past and present into a coherent narrative about H’s secret revenge wish in a super-charged atmosphere of high-end heist with multiple motives.
It’s interesting to contrast Statham’s stoicism with Bob Odenkirk’s relatively more animated dad in the recent actioner, Nobody. Both have scores to settle but come at the revenge in different ways. Such is the lucrative world of kick-butt heroes. There is plenty of room for shenanigans that are at the same time absurd and rational.
Helpful to underscore the criminal side of this film is Christopher Benstead’s suspenseful score, slightly reminiscent of Bernard Hermann’s Hitchcock work. Emphasizing the lighter side of the story are the characters’ nicknames seemingly out of the comic books: Bullet (Holt McCallany), Boy Sweat Dave (Josh Hartnett), Hollow Bob (Rocci Williams), and Hot Betty (?).
Add a creative filmmaker like Guy Ritchie, who is at home with Sherlock and Statham, and even Madonna. Without the cockney that demands subtitles in his previous actioners with Statham, Wrath is set in LA. Called The Gentlemen, it shows Ritchie’s ability to mix light and dark, like this lightly grim but eventful Wrath of Man.
“Let the painter paint.” The Fed (Andy Garcia) about violent H
Wrath of Man
Director: Guy Ritchie (The Gentlemen)
Screenplay: Ritchie, et al.
Cast: Jason Statham (Transporter)
Run Time: 1h 58m
Rating: R
John DeSando, a Los Angeles Press Club first-place winner for National Entertainment Journalism, hosts WCBE’s It’s Movie Time and co-hosts Cinema Classics. Contact him at JohnDeSando62@gmail.com
