What the hell have you done lately?

Rating: 6/10 (26 December 2008)

Okay, so here's my 'world first' idea. Do you remember reading those 'Choose Your Own Adventure' books as a kid? Basically you read a few paragraphs and at the end of the page you are presented with a choice. Now if you were like me, you probably didn't even bother to read the text, instead you just skipped right to the next choice? Yeah, I bet you did. You look like the sort of punk who would. Anyway, what I want to do here is a 'world first' in film reviewing - yes, I want to do a 'Choose Your Own Adventure' film review.
It's pretty simple: read both of the options below and choose the one which suits you best.
Option #1: I am completely happy and content with my job, my partner, and my life in general. If you answered 'yes' - stop reading this review right now! Instantly give this film a zero, close your web browser, and happily go about your awesomely awesome life... you smarmy little prick.

Alternatively -

Option #2: My life sucks balls. I feel like eating a gun every god damn morning I wake up. I am counting the days until I go on a killing spree with an AK47 at my local post office. If you answered 'yes', welcome to the fraternity. Please continue reading this review.
Hmmm. Chances are you went with Option #2, didn't you, you emo little punk?
So what is my grand theory? Well, my theory is that if you are content and happy with your life, chances are you will absolutely hate Wanted.
'Inspired' by the graphic novel of the same name, Wanted tells the story of Wesley Gibson (James McAvoy), a Gen-Y slacker accountant who finds out that not only was his long lost father the world's greatest assassin, but the fact that his father was recently murdered, and the organization he worked for now wishes to recruit Wesley in order to eliminate the man who killed his father. Sounds like Citizen Kane, huh? Notice that I used the word 'inspired'. While I haven't read any of the Wanted graphic novels, generally I don't stray very far from The Punisher MAX series, the word on the street seems to indicate that the film shares very little in common with the graphic novel, aside from the obvious titular similarities.
First things first, Wanted is a 'leave your brain at the door' type of film - 'leave your brain at the door' being film reviewer code for 'most people will probably think that this is a complete piece of junk, but for some reason I kind of liked it'. The trailers tipped us off to the fact that this was going to be a big, dumb, over-the-top action film wrapped loosely in some ridiculous theme about fate, with a couple of gimmicks tacked-on to separate it from the herd. Yeah, that's more or less what you can expect. From the opening title card outlining a thousand year old order of assassins known as The Fraternity, followed closely by a Matrix-esq confrontation between one of their agents and a group of protagonists, we quickly realize that any grounding in reality has probably just vanished quicker than a rapper at the scene of a drive-by. While I'm not going to give too much of the story away here, let's just say that we see our Fraternity agent leap through an office building window a hundred meters in the air, across the city skyline, over to another building at least fifty meters away. Yep, those patrons in the audience that aren't familiar with the concept of the suspension of disbelief are going to be in for a rude shock.
Oh, and then there's the infamous bullet-curving from the trailer...
I can't remember the bullet-curving gimmick being adequately explained anywhere in the film, but then again, there was so much 'out there' stuff going on that I had all but given up on finding logic by that stage... I certainly wasn't in the mood to question known ballistic trajectory theory. I just decided to roll with it.
The main thing that works in Wanted's favor is the whole Gen-Y slacker angle. Like I mentioned previously, Wanted is little more than an average action film with a couple of gimmicks - the element that will ultimately strike a chord with the average viewer will be Wesley Gibson's potential transformation from a nobody into a cold-blooded killing machine. Wesley is a pussy, even by this own admission. He's stuck in a dead-end job, he's flat broke, his girlfriend is cheating on him with his best friend and he can't even be bothered to do anything about it - he has absolutely no purpose in life... and he gets to repeat this routine on a daily basis. Wesley Gibson could easily be you or I.
Is it obvious that I'm trying to delay the inevitable? Okay, I'm going to have to score this thing soon enough.
Wanted is an interesting creature. I came into the film almost wanting to hate it - I wanted to hate it purely because it looked like yet another over-the-top graphic novel adaptation in a sea of over-the-top graphic novel adaptations. If you boiled the film down into its base components, realistically there's not a lot to it... but there was just something about the damn thing that struck a chord in me. Maybe it's the fact that I'm just a nobody like Wesley Gibson, a nobody struggling for identity and purpose, a nobody who would happily spend his days banging Angelina Jolie and doing a little contract killing on the side.
Edited excerpt from: www.youseenthat.com