Style and no substances

Rating: 5/10 (8 April 2009)

Wanted is based a comic book series by Mark Millar (who has written for Spiderman, Superman, X-Men and Wolverine). Sadly this film did not encourage me to buy the series. Wanted is an perfect example of style over substance which leads to a heartless experience.
Wanted focuses on Wesley Gibson (James McAvoy), a young man who hates his office job, whom girlfriend is having an affair with his best friend and suffers from 'anxity attacks'. One day when he is shopping a woman named Fox (Angelina Jolie) who tells Wesley's father had just been killed by a rogue agent called Cross (Thomas Kretschmann) and he was the best assassin in the world. Cross also targets Wesley and Fox saves his life. She takes to Welsey to the Fraternity of Assassins run by Sloan (Morgan Freeman), who tells him that people are genetically able to become assassins and bend bullets. Wesley gets the excitement he has been craving, and trains hards to use his abilities to the fullest. Wesley seeks revenge for the death of his father and does as much research as he can about Cross to ensure he kills him. Sloan tells Welsey that the Fraternity picks it targets using a loom which uses binary code, picking targets by fate. Fox tells Welsey the philosophy of the Fraternity is kill one, save a-thousand and bring balance to the world, and shows her own dark origins.
The film is shallow, with un-engaging characters. You wonder why we should really care for Welsey throughout the film. The themes of fate basically feel like it added to show there is more to the film. The film is trying to be the Matrix but obviously no where need as good or deep as that film. The other major problem of the film is it's predictable. It was clear from the beginning that the Fraternity isn't as good as they made themselves out to be. The plot is very thin and clichéd.
There are some positives from this film. They is a good cast, McAvoy, Jolie, Freeman and Kretschmann are all top actors. It's also good to see Marc Warren to be in a Hollywood film. Some of the action scenes were very well done, you would like it if you like high-octane action. I think Timur Bekmambetov has potential to be a good director in Hollywood, as long as he good material. His next film, 9, looks like it would be good.
Wanted felt like a film made for 12-year-old boys with added sex and violence.
2 out of 5.