The original Hitman game was released on PC on November 19, 2000. I never got to play that game but I have played through every sequel since then. Hitman is a stealth focused game where you play as Agent 47 – a bald assassin with a barcode tattooed on the back of his neck who wears a black suit with a red tie. The goal of the games is to locate your targets and kill them by any means possible while not being discovered. You can poison their food, drop a object onto them, or simply strangle them with a wire. In 2007 they adapted the game into a critically panned major motion picture starring Timothy Olyphant and Olga Kurylenko. For whatever reason, in 2013 Fox decided to reboot the license into a new film that was supposed to star Paul Walker. Due to his death in 2014, Rupert Friend took over the role and the new film is entitled Hitman: Agent 47.
This new iteration of the franchise puts a mysterious girl named Katia (Hannah Ware) into the forefront of the story. She doesn’t remember exactly who she is and has been frantically searching for her father’s ware bouts. Agent 47 (Rupert Friend) is tasked to kill her but instead he decides to help her because she is being hunted by a man named John Smith (Zachary Quinto) who has unknown intentions.
This film is bad, so bad in fact that it makes the 2007 film look like an Academy Award nominee. Firstly, the acting is atrocious. Characters are so completely two-dimensional that I actually feel that a lot of dialogue was simply borrowed from the games. Time and time again exposition dumps are unloaded on the audience in an effort to try and make the overcomplicated and absurd plot somewhat realistic. In addition, Rupert Friend’s British accent slips out from time to time and his character goes back and forth from being an emotionless robot to a sentimental wimp.
As stated before, the games are all about stealth. While the 2007 film included some cool stealth elements, this film is a bombastic train wreck of CGI effects, faceless enemies, and gigantic, uninspired set piece moments. Someway, somehow all of the enemies know exactly where Agent 47 will be and they are constantly appearing out of nowhere in order to try and take him down. The most ridiculous example of this is a car chase scene where bad guys try to stop his car by using special harpoon guns. Did they somehow instinctively know he was going to be in a car chase? Did they also know exactly where he was going to be in order to set up their special weapons? Why don’t they just shoot him when he exits the vehicle instead of trying to repel down to him and getting killed in the process? These are a few of the many questions that I had while trying to understand how this script ever got green lit.
There is only one thing that I liked about this film – the fan service. Throughout the course of the film there are several nods to the games that are subtle but if you have played them before they are a nice wink that you might enjoy. My favorite has to be the fact that Agent 47 is actually a clone. The 2007 film alluded that he is merely one of several different trained agents but here the whole clone angle is well addressed. Pushing that aside though, this film is still ridiculously terrible. Even if you’re a hardcore fan like myself, Hitman: Agent 47 should have been assassinated before ever hitting theaters.
Hitman: Agent 47:[usr 1]
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=alQlJDRnQkE]
About Hitman: Agent 47
Synopsis: A trained assassin teams up with a mysterious woman in order to track down her father and stop a maniacal villain.
Director: Aleksander Bach
Writers: Skip Woods, Michael Finch
Stars: Rupert Friend, Zachary Quinto, Hannah Ware, Ciaran Hinds
Rated: R
Runtime: 96 min
Just call me “Turbo” because it sums me up in a single word. I’m originally from Visalia, California but currently reside in Mesa, Arizona. I’m a movie and video game fanatic with a BA in Film and Media Production from ASU. I try to see every movie that I can (new and old) as well as play the latest video game releases. My goal in life would be to create a feature length film which viewers absolutely love. However, until then I love to entertain people with my 100+ voice impersonations as well as fill them in with the latest movie/ gaming news on Twitter. Facebook.com/turbizl, Twitter: @turbizl
