Wanted (2008)

Video games are fun. They're a fantasy as deep as fantasy can go; where films merely show you exciting and exotic professions, video games allow you the magic of interaction, involving you to the fullest level possible outside of actually doing it. With video games, you are given the chance to be a hit-man, a guitar hero, a superstar athlete, or the Chosen One, tasked with saving a fair maiden, or an entire world. Wanted has the DNA of a video game, but you have to sit and watch someone else play.

Wanted is a film made by men who work tireless, empty office jobs, watch Fight Club and Office Space, and fantasize about emulating Edward Norton and Ron Livingston. These are white men who have a DVD collection full of action movies, including perhaps Gone in 60 Seconds (the remake), and all three Matrix films (ESPECIALLY those), and have an extensive video game collection, including Grand Theft Auto, Burnout, The Legend of Zelda and Max Payne. These are men who enjoy intense, industrial and rap-metal, Nine Inch Nails and Korn chief among them. One day, they got home, watched The Matrix, played Max Payne, saw the video for Korn's "Freak on a Leash", and epiphanically said, "Dude." The entire mythology of Wanted can be unspooled simply by taking a cursory look around their shabby apartments. A normal man is informed that he is The Chosen One, out to avenge his murdered father, and is drafted into a secret group of gun-wielding revolutionaries that take him from his dead-end office job and train him. They train him to do amazing things to manipulate time and space, specifically in the form of moving and dodging bullets. He is tasked with practicing in hand, knife and firearm combat in various, shall we say, "levels". Sometimes he fails. No worries, he has infinite lives, as each time he is injured, the narrative merely restarts from a standard save point (in this point, a sort of bathhouse room) with all wounds healed, allowing him to try again. He is given a set group of tasks where he has to commit various acts of violence. Upon completion of these tasks (and a series of non-action-based cutscenes), he gets closer and closer to his ultimate goal, a 'boss fight' if you will. There are a few twists and turns, and we are taken to exotic locales and have plenty of running, car chases and gunplay.

Unfortunately, another aspect in which Wanted resembles a video game is in its poor acting. James McAvoy's delivery is unbelievably poor. His American accent is solid, but he has no range and no believability whatsoever. Angelina Jolie has big fake-looking-lips and a gangly strut (although, if this was a video game, her breasts would be substantially larger; see Tomb Raider). Morgan Freeman is the token respectable name slumming, and he has such an authoritative voice that he sticks out for commendation even when he's phoning it in. The rest of the cast is generic in a way that you couldn't recognize them or care to if they weren't live in person in front of you.

Now, this is not to say that a film that looks and runs like a video game can't be fun. Running Scared had a gonzo quality that still amounted to a 'go here and find this' plot line, and managed to be brilliantly entertaining. Crank was a bit more empty, but had several fantastically silly bits of over-the-top action that made you giggle even as you didn't care. Even Jumper salvaged a decent score because its effects were unique and exciting. Wanted lacks here as well. The film has a couple nifty scenes but overall, nothing all that fantastic occurs (specifically, nothing you haven't seen in The Matrix), and the film has so much slow-motion, the makers of 300 thought it was overkill.

As stated, it's no fun to watch someone else play video games, and although they occasionally take your advice ("Dude, go back to your apartment and punch that douchebag Barry"; "Oh sweet, I had to go retrieve the gun here anyway, thanks, bro"), for the most part, they frustrate you with their inability to instantly perform the tasks, and the character is sort of whiny and annoying anyway, and it's just not that much fun, especially since you've played so many games like this that were a lot more fun. Wanted is a mediocre video game, and a mediocre film. The film apparently did in fact get a video game translation. I can't speak for its quality, but as a film, Wanted feels like you rented a game, your friend made you watch him play, then took it back to the video store without even telling you.

What a gyp.

{Grade: 5.5/10 (high C) / #29 (of 64) of 2008}