Toronto - Lets get the basics out of the way first: This movie is essentially a mashup of The Matrix vs the Fight Club vs John Woo’s movie. As you undoubtedly know by now, Wanted is a movie about a would-be loser living a boring life (ie. Ed Norton in Fight Club or Neo in the Matrix) who finds himself thrown into a world of Assassins who kill “1 to save 1000″. Angelina Jolie plays Carrie Ann Moss (only hotter, although that is not hard to achieve) and Morgan Freeman adopts the Morpheus role. Thats about as much plot as I’ll write about, since it’s mostly irrelevant.

Action. That is what Wanted is about. Check your brain at the door and enter a world where bullets can curve, cars can flip at will and people can leap across buildings. From the opening scene til the credits, this movie is pretty much non stop “chris bridges” action. So what separates this movie from the rest of the movie? Style. There are shoot’em up assassin movies all the time, but this one does it with massive style. It seems as if every action sequence in the movie pushes the envelop just a bit. A car chase scene is usually pretty exciting, but you know what..lets have Angelina Jolie in a dress lying down on the hood of the car shooting the truck behind her while steering the car with her legs!. Thats the insanity I be speaking of. I think a few times in the movie, I spoke out loud with a “WHAT!” at some of the stuff you see. However, this movie was built with ‘fun’ in mind, and it fits the bill.

The other thing I love about this movie is the complete disregard for human life. I can’t remember the last assassin/action movie where so many innocent/pedestrians die. You know Ron Howard can’t pull off this shit. Thats whats refreshing about having this russian director. Too often we’ve seen gun fights where the hero saves a baby in the middle of the gun fight or helps a senior across the street or something. In Wanted? Nope. You dead, if you in the way. Thats the way Assassins should be. James McAvoy cares not if he has to kill hundreds of people to get to his man, thats what it takes to get the job done, son.

So how is the acting? Stellar. We all know current boy-du-jour James McAvoy can act from Atonement and Last King of Scotland, and he really does a good job conveying the transition from poor office nerd to cold blooded killer. Much better then Neo, but every Keanu Reeves movie, I expect him to say ‘whoa’ for some reason. Angelina Jolie doesn’t really do much in the movie, aside from show off her ass, her tattoos and her twigly arms. I think she needs to eat some more. Having said that, it never hurts to have Angelina Jolie in a movie, even if the only emotion she shows is that of no emotion. Morgan Freeman, is Morgan Freeman. He’s old, he’s wise.

In conclusion, you should see this movie. It’s got insane action, it’s got humor, its two hours of escape and you will leave the theatre with a smile on your face.

4/5