Movie Review – Hitman: Agent 47

The dog days of summer are upon us. In the movie industry this equates to the “smoke and mirrors false promises end of the summer everything must go” phenomenon. By that I mean that there’s a reason the majority of these movies are being released now versus earlier in the summer when most of the potential blockbusters are paraded in front of our eyes by various studios. By the time August rolls around we’re at the “well I didn’t hate HATE the movie” phase of things. Expectations are lowered, and by no small coincidence, so is the incoming revenue gained. Hitman: Agent 47 falls smack dab in the middle of this purgatory of profit. Let’s get right to it then, shall we?
Based on the uber-popular video game franchise, Hitman, this is the second attempt at bringing the violent killer with a contract to life in movie form. Timothy Olyphant donned the signature black suit, white shirt, red tie and dual hand guns back in 2007. That version misfired from a critic’s perspective and never made enough of an impact to garner a sequel. Eight years later, 20th Century Fox has decided to hit the reset button and try again. Hitman: Agent 47 stars Rupert Friend (Homeland) as Agent 47 who is attempting to close a contract. There are many layers to what is going on with this particular target which will lead to several countries in the hopes of terminating his latest bounty. The key to everything is a mysterious girl who is known as Katia (Hannah Ware). Katia is on a mission of her own as she tries to uncover the mysteries and whereabouts of her father who abandoned her as a child. Then there’s the mysterious John Smith (Zachary Quinto) and rarely seen overseer of evil, Le Clerq (Thomas Kretschmann). Their roles in this mystery (which is a term I’m using extremely loosely here) becomes pretty clear as things progress.
There’s no other way to put it other than to say that Hitman: Agent 47 is flawed. From the beginning of the movie to the very last second there are things to not like about it. It truly has a video game feel to it in that you don’t care one iota about the well being of any of the characters. It’s just a matter of waiting around to see how everything plays out. I mean you’re here, you’re watching so you might as well see how it all plays out. The plot tries to mimic that of a European espionage action flick but doesn’t quite make it to that level. There’s quite a bit of action with lots of bloody killing. With the amount of headshots to nondescript extras it really does feel like a video game.
The overall enjoyability level really does depend on your expectations of this type of move. Pro tip: LOWER THEM. From the trailers to the commercials to the synopsis, Hitman: Agent 47 is exactly what you think it is. A high body count, low intelligence shoot ‘em up action movie with lots of people who aren’t even given names. The fact that it’s based on a video game should give a big clue as to what type of action you’ll be seeing. The lone saving grace though is that director Aleksander Bach embraced the R rating while banking on the kills to help carry the movie. Sorry to break it to ya Mr. Bach but this movie will still crash and burn.
Hitman: Agent 47 isn’t ready for the limelight and will therefore be relegated to the fast track of Blu-ray rentals. Sorry but once again this is yet another one and done fruitless franchise reboot. The kindest thing that could be said about the reboot is that even as poorly as it performs, it probably won’t be the biggest disappointment of the weekend’s new releases.