The Sunday Mail
Film Review
Tinashe Kusema
IT is easy to quickly dismiss “Without Remorse” as a terrible movie.
How so?
The film suffers from an “outdated” script.
Remember, the production has been stuck in developmental hell for a good 28 years.
During the time, Keanu Reeves and Tom Hardy have been approached and signed on to star as lead character John Kelly.
Similarly, the script has gone through many hands, with “Sons of Anarchy” writer Taylor Sheridan getting the final nod in 2018.
Michael B Jordan also signed on to take up the role of US navy seal, Kelly, around that time. Resultantly, we have a film lost in time.
It is now unable to connect with the modern-day audience.
Perhaps the script would have worked wonders back then.
Also known as “Tom Clancy’s Without Remorse”, the film sees Kelly and his seal team go on a routine rescue mission.
Their objective is to retrieve a CIA operative taken hostage by suspected Syrian terrorists.
Unfortunately, once on the scene, they discover that the terrorists are actually Russian and not all is what it seems.
The said terrorists track down and kill Kelly’s seal team.
Sadly, the casualties include his heavily pregnant wife.
Left for dead, Kelly recovers and sets about avenging his now-deceased family.
The more he digs, the more he uncovers a deep conspiracy.
Talk of a conspiracy closer to home than the Syrian mission and Russian thugs’ involvement.
That aside, there are so many things wrong with this movie.
A couple of well-choreographed action sequences seem to be the film’s saving grace.
Oh! Add a surprisingly eerie performance by Guy Pearce (Thomas Clay) there.
I was not impressed by Michael B Jordan’s performance in Black Panther (Erik Killmonger) and have opted to reserve judgement on his acting chops.
Likewise, his role as John Kelly does not inspire confidence.
It was terrible!
I wonder how an actor of his repute dismally fails to sell grief.
Jordan’s terrible performance actually spells doom for the rest of the movie.
He was supposed to be the film’s star power, as there is not much material for the rest of the cast.
“Without Remorse” seems to have taken a wrong leaf from “Bone Collector”.
They fail to make proper use of the big bad.
The main antagonist of the movie is in and out of the movie until the third act and even then his motives are flimsy.
After the arrival of films like “Inception”, “Shutter Island”, “Memento” and “Fight Club”, the audience now know what they want.
We now expect more from movies when it comes to reveals and complex plots.
One gets the feeling that everyone involved had lost interest in this movie.
Who can blame them, considering the near three-decade wait?
The uninspiring and outdated theme easily proves the cast was just fulfilling contractual obligations.
