War

Directed by: Philip G. Atwell
Written by: Lee Anthony Smith, Gregory J. Bradley
Starring: Jason Statham, Jet Li, Devon Aoki, Luis Guzmán, Ryo Ishibashi, John Lone

Score: 3.5/10

Mindless action movies are something of an enigma. Sometimes they can be a complete blast and you can just sit back and enjoy the ride. While other times it’s a complete chore to sit through the movie, believe it or not there is still some talent required to make a fun mindless action movie. War seems to have checked the talent at the door, and while it’s definitely mindless action - it falls into the category of chore.

FBI agent Jack Crawford (Jason Statham) is after the man who killed his partner, a mysterious assassin known only as Rouge (Jet Li). It’s your basic revenge plot, and if action movies have taught us anything it’s that revenge is the perfect starting point to do just about anything.

The biggest problem this movie has is the fact that it’s relying on Jason Statham and Jet Li. Two actors who have become so tired and stale that it’s so boring watching them on screen. I’m sure Jet Li is a fine actor in his native language, but in English and a starring role no less it’s just doesn’t work, and have I missed something over the years, are these two actors a big draw for audiences? Honestly these two keep making the same movie over and over. It amazes me that studios keep paying for these things. I don’t think they bring in that much cash, but maybe I’m completely wrong. The whole money argument aside, I’m not one of those people who actually care what a movie makes. As long as you make a good flick, I’m just trying to justify to myself how these two actors keep getting cast in these generic action movies

Written by two newcomers and directed by a music video director, War is the perfect example of a movie that is trying to be very stylish and cool, but just doesn’t understand what stylish and cool means. In a movie all about the action it’s probably a good idea to bring some sort of substance to the action scenes. Not the case in War as the action is so poorly directed that it just becomes a bunch of fast moving people on a screen. The director can’t take all the blame as a big chunk of what’s wrong with this movie is the clichéd filled script and the absolutely ridiculous plot twists that come at the end.

The simple plot that War presents should have been enough to deliver some cool action sequences, and really that’s all I wanted from this movie. I would have been happy with that, but it quickly turns into a giant mess of a movie that tries to do a lot more than it should be doing. I really shouldn’t fault a movie for wanting to be more than it is, but if the filmmakers had realized what they were working with then a decent action flick may have been the end result.

Overall, War is pretty much a disaster. It’s poorly directed action and ridiculous plot twists make it a rental at best. Just avoid it and try and catch one of the better movies this summer that you might have missed.