American Assassin

Starring: Dylan O'Brien, Michael Keaton, Taylor Kitsch, Charlotte Vega
Directed by: Michael Cuesta
Rating: R
Genre: Action, Thriller
2017

Times Seen:
Tim: 1

Summary: After surviving a brutal terrorist attack, a man (Dylan O'Brien) seeks revenge by joining the CIA.

Review:

Tim: American Assassin has a few positive things going for it, but despite these, it never manages to not feel like a second-rate action thriller. It's fine, there's decent moments throughout the movie, the cast is solid. And yet, it's a bit too outlandish, too generic, too forgettable. It's a decent movie, but one that you walk away from with a shrug instead of any kind of legitimate excitement.

The movie starts out really well, though. The terrorist attack was frightening, believable, and it put you right in the middle of the action. It was exceptionally well done. From there, the movie starts to feel more and more like countless other movies. Rather than living up to the bar it sets with its opening scene, it feels like it aims its sights much, much lower. None of the sequences from then on are bad, they're just mediocre. A few cool moments here and there aren't enough to save the pedestrian plot. The ending of the film with the nuclear warhead just didn't feel believable in the least. Some of that is that the budget was strained too much, so the visual effects let the movie down. The rest of the blame for the ending belongs with the script. There were just too many "yeah right" moments.

The cast is actually one of the big strengths. I really like Dylan O'Brien. It feels like he puts everything he had into his roles. He's still young and that youth shows up on occasion in his performance. But, for the most part, he's effective and we can relate to him. Casting him was a very good move. I also loved seeing Michael Keaton here. While this felt like a step back from some of the better films choices he's made in recent years, it was probably fun to play this character. It was certainly fun to watch him. Ultimately, the character is too forgettable, but Keaton's presence was welcome. Taylor Kitsch made a fairly decent bad guy. I hated this guy the first couple of times I saw him, but I'm slowly warming up to him. He's not bad in his antagonistic role.

Some of the elements of the story were entertaining. It's fun to see behind-the-scenes into a black ops CIA team. The training scenes were solid and a few of the espionage moments were fairly decent. The movie slowly becomes less believable the longer it goes on, but some of the early scenes were pretty good.

American Assassin certainly isn't a bad movie, but it has no hope of being anything more than decent. I enjoyed moments of it, but was turned off by others. Ultimately, though, the movie is way too forgettable (just like its bland title)- I doubt I'll be able to recall anything about it in a year.

Rating 1-10
Tim's Rating: 6.5



If You Enjoyed This Movie, We Recommend: The Recruit, Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit