Remo Williams meets The Matrix?

Rating: 7/10 (1 May 2011)

Everything about Wesley Gibson (James McAvoy) points to how miserable he really is. He's at a dead end job, his girlfriend is sleeping around, he takes antidepressants and his boss is a pain in the ass. He wonders how his life could be different but he's stuck in a fantastic rut with no end in sight.
Little did he know his father had passed away leaving him to a secret fraternity of assassins and he'd be trained by a man named Sloan, (Morgan Freeman) who operates outside the confines of the law and independent of any of the world's governments. Fox takes him under his wing, tells him his anxiety problem is actually a gift of being able to speed your heart rate up releasing adrenaline and slowing down time. He also tells him his father was killed by a double crossing member of the brotherhood ironically named, Cross (Thomas Kretschmann).
This plot eventually forces Wesley and his mentor/trainer Fox (Angelina Jolie) to question the integrity of the brotherhood and Sloan's methods in a spectacular confrontation close to the end of the movie.
Without giving away too much of the plot the theme of the movie appears to be in line with that of The Matrix in that it is a fantastical adventure for someone caught in what appears to be an inescapable reality of mundane existence. The fact that Wesley is barely living his life makes you want to cheer for this nerdy slob. He is in fact everyone who is sick and tired of their job, life, partner, and in many ways living in general.
Contrast is given when Wesley finds out he doesn't have common problems like anxiety and that he didn't need medication he needed to be trained how to use it to his advantage. Who wouldn't like to be someone like James Bond and a Thomas Anderson (Neo) all rolled up into one? It's only when he's made to be a fugitive by Sloan that Wesley embraces the lifestyle the Fraternity has to offer.
This film uses gritty acting along with a ton of eye candy to tell the story. Real time three dimensional effects speed and slow time forcing you to suspend all disbelief and buy in to the premise that a lowly desk jockey named Wesley could become one of the greatest assassins the world has ever known.