A disturbing trend that seems to have no end in sight is the constant making of movies based upon video games. The fact of the matter is that these movies largely end up being horrendous misinterpretations of the source material. As evidenced by such cinematic horror shows like the Resident Evil movies, Street Fighter, Super Mario Brothers, Tomb Raider, and every movie by Uwe Boll. Of course there is the occasional movie that proves the maxim wrong, I for one enjoyed the Final Fantasy movie: The Spirits Within. Granted it had next to nothing to do with the game series apart from the name, but I was able to enjoy it. There was also the Silent Hill movie, that was great due to the fact that it was able to maintain a majority of the atmosphere from the games, and the plot was largely consistent with the mythos of the Silent Hill series. Unfortunately the latest movie to try to adapt a video game has largely failed to take even the smallest modicum of what made the games enjoyable.
Hit-man, a movie based on a good action series, isn't exactly a bad movie. If you go into the movie without having played the games by IO Interactive, then you'll in all likelihood be entertained by the action this movie has to offer. Fans of the games however will most likely be left feeling cheated by the movie, and it's radical changing of the main character of the series. In the movie it explains that 47 and the other bald headed assassins were chosen at birth to become guinea pigs of a top-secret plot to breed trained killers who feel no remorse. Now if this reminds you of anything, you're a nerd, and yes it's totally ripping off part of the plot for the old TV show: Dark Angel. I don't mean to go all nerdy video game fan boy on you, but, in the games 47 wasn't chosen at birth to become the bad ass assassin he is today. He's a clone of four major criminals and a scientist to make a flawless human. Not once in the entire series of games do they state whether or not 47 has a childhood. If they had felt the need to do an origin story for 47, why not just base it off the story elements of the original Hit-man: Codename 47 game? And throw in bits of the missions from Contracts.
Before I continue on with the review I would like to state the fact that this movie was written by Skip Woods. The man that brought us the terrible movie Swordfish. While I had nothing overly against that film, it bears mention due to the fact that at times the plot of that movie was positively horrid, and as such Woods needs to be beaten with an oar.
The movie starts out with an Interpol agent returning to his home, 47 is there sitting in his chair. Aiming his gun at fearless Dougray Scott. The movie then keenly informs us that the bulk of the story takes place three months prior to this scene. 47 has been hired to take out the Russian prime minister Mikhail Belicoff. The hit goes off with seemingly no problem, but Diana, 47's handler for the Agency (called "The Organization" in this) informs him that there's a witness he needs to eliminate. The witness, Nika is played by the wonderful Olga Kurylenko, when 47 goes to eliminate Nika another hit-man from Agency arrives to kill 47 and Nika. 47 escapes and confronts Diana about how Nika wasn't a witness, and whether or not someone at the agency double crossed him. While this is happening the Russian police is sending in its crack squad of cops who look like they were stolen from the anime Jin-Roh: The Wolf Brigade, to capture or kill 47. Dougray has a problem with this as he wants 47 alive for questioning, as he's wanted for multiple hundreds of murders across the globe. How he was to establish it was only 47, I'll never know.
After a moderately decent action scene 47 kidnaps Nika and takes her to a St. Petersburg train station where he's attacked by a cadre of Agency trained hit men. The problem I have with this part is the fact that the assassins are fundamentally working toward the same goal, kill 47. At this point when 47 is outgunned by three other assassins, instead of just ventilating 47 they aim their guns at each other. At which point 47 proposes that they die with honor, and brandish some wakizashi swords and proceed to fight. The fight scene is decent enough, but it was just pointless. Where was 47 hiding those little buggers, and why didn't 47's would-be killers just kill him and then go knock off for a while at the nearest bar? I would go further into the plot, but really, I don't feel like spoiling it any more than I already have. Suffice to say that I didn't exactly enjoy the story to the movie. It took far too many liberties with the character of 47, and far too much of it seemed implausible from the perspective of realism. Also there's the questionable choice in casting Timothy Olyphant as the cold steely eyed assassin: Mr. 47. I don't hate the guy, it's just that I think he's a highly inappropriate choice. Granted he was a decent enough actor in that atrocious show Deadwood. He just looks too young, and not at all what a ruthless killer should look like.
Overall the movie is a mediocre action film that people who've never played the games will most likely enjoy. Fans of the series however would probably hate it due to the large number of liberties they take with the character and source material. Overall the movie is not worth the time to watch it.
Hit-man, a movie based on a good action series, isn't exactly a bad movie. If you go into the movie without having played the games by IO Interactive, then you'll in all likelihood be entertained by the action this movie has to offer. Fans of the games however will most likely be left feeling cheated by the movie, and it's radical changing of the main character of the series. In the movie it explains that 47 and the other bald headed assassins were chosen at birth to become guinea pigs of a top-secret plot to breed trained killers who feel no remorse. Now if this reminds you of anything, you're a nerd, and yes it's totally ripping off part of the plot for the old TV show: Dark Angel. I don't mean to go all nerdy video game fan boy on you, but, in the games 47 wasn't chosen at birth to become the bad ass assassin he is today. He's a clone of four major criminals and a scientist to make a flawless human. Not once in the entire series of games do they state whether or not 47 has a childhood. If they had felt the need to do an origin story for 47, why not just base it off the story elements of the original Hit-man: Codename 47 game? And throw in bits of the missions from Contracts.
Before I continue on with the review I would like to state the fact that this movie was written by Skip Woods. The man that brought us the terrible movie Swordfish. While I had nothing overly against that film, it bears mention due to the fact that at times the plot of that movie was positively horrid, and as such Woods needs to be beaten with an oar.
The movie starts out with an Interpol agent returning to his home, 47 is there sitting in his chair. Aiming his gun at fearless Dougray Scott. The movie then keenly informs us that the bulk of the story takes place three months prior to this scene. 47 has been hired to take out the Russian prime minister Mikhail Belicoff. The hit goes off with seemingly no problem, but Diana, 47's handler for the Agency (called "The Organization" in this) informs him that there's a witness he needs to eliminate. The witness, Nika is played by the wonderful Olga Kurylenko, when 47 goes to eliminate Nika another hit-man from Agency arrives to kill 47 and Nika. 47 escapes and confronts Diana about how Nika wasn't a witness, and whether or not someone at the agency double crossed him. While this is happening the Russian police is sending in its crack squad of cops who look like they were stolen from the anime Jin-Roh: The Wolf Brigade, to capture or kill 47. Dougray has a problem with this as he wants 47 alive for questioning, as he's wanted for multiple hundreds of murders across the globe. How he was to establish it was only 47, I'll never know.
After a moderately decent action scene 47 kidnaps Nika and takes her to a St. Petersburg train station where he's attacked by a cadre of Agency trained hit men. The problem I have with this part is the fact that the assassins are fundamentally working toward the same goal, kill 47. At this point when 47 is outgunned by three other assassins, instead of just ventilating 47 they aim their guns at each other. At which point 47 proposes that they die with honor, and brandish some wakizashi swords and proceed to fight. The fight scene is decent enough, but it was just pointless. Where was 47 hiding those little buggers, and why didn't 47's would-be killers just kill him and then go knock off for a while at the nearest bar? I would go further into the plot, but really, I don't feel like spoiling it any more than I already have. Suffice to say that I didn't exactly enjoy the story to the movie. It took far too many liberties with the character of 47, and far too much of it seemed implausible from the perspective of realism. Also there's the questionable choice in casting Timothy Olyphant as the cold steely eyed assassin: Mr. 47. I don't hate the guy, it's just that I think he's a highly inappropriate choice. Granted he was a decent enough actor in that atrocious show Deadwood. He just looks too young, and not at all what a ruthless killer should look like.
Overall the movie is a mediocre action film that people who've never played the games will most likely enjoy. Fans of the series however would probably hate it due to the large number of liberties they take with the character and source material. Overall the movie is not worth the time to watch it.
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