McAvoy falls from grace

Rating: 2/10 (24 November 2008)

James McAvoy hits a career setback in this disjointed, unoriginal action flick about a fraternity of assassin weavers.
Wesley struggles in the rat race day after day, hiding from hideous boss Janice in his cubicle, popping pills for anxiety while aware that his girlfriend and best mate are at it behind his back.
This is an unlikely start for a superhero, but Wesley discovers he is descended from a line of super-assassins who go back a millennium. He undertakes training in order to kill the rogue assassin who shot his own father.
Pretty quickly, the inconsistencies and coincidences seep in and sink this film. The assassins' victims are chosen by a loom. No explanation given. The assassins heal their wounds by bathing in a magical fluid. No explanation given. They are capable of gravity-defying feats. No... you get the idea.
In a perhaps unintended irony, David O'Hara is presented as McAvoy's father, both actors struggling to suppress their Scottish accents under an American one. The Fraternity can defy physics, but linguistics seems to defeat them. What is it about Scottish male actors that they cannot master an American accent? (The guilty include Brian Cox, Sean Connery, John Hannah, Ewan McGregor... Kelly Macdonald shows the women are different).
It is all very flat and unconvincing. WHY did the loom start to name the Fraternity as targets? If they were a problem, why didn't the loom just name itself for destruction? What brings about Jolie's change of heart at the end? The comedy is tepid, the "You're the man" line being a typical example. All in all, a bit of a waste of time.