“Hey, Jimmy! Go stand in front of the garage door! I’m gonna curve a bullet past your head like James McAvoy in Universal’s big summer release, Wanted!” Bang. “Shit! Where does mom keep the super glue?”
Look, I’m not going to blame Timur Bekmambetov, Mark Millar or Angelina Jolie when kids start plugging each other full of lead in an effort to replicate the CG-enhanced bullet curving stunt in Wanted. But just as Jackass continues to inspire imbeciles to commit all sorts of unsafe shenanigans (what’s a redneck’s last words… ?), this very cool looking and utterly derivative bit of action business is going to have a body count. I’m certain of it. (Even though this new trailer takes pains to inform us that very few people in the world possess the power to manipulate bullets.)
The non-impressionable, however, should have a pretty good time with this silly spectacle, which stars McAvoy as a slacker-turned-assassin and Angelina Jolie as his homely-lookin’ partner. The plot has something to do with carrying out “death orders given by fate itself”, but, basically, it looks like a flimsy excuse to perpetrate vehicular mayhem. There is a place for such things. It’s called summer.
Those who’ve read the comic tell me that the film is an extremely loose adaptation. Sucks for them. The rest of us should have a mindless hoot when this big blast of stupid hits theaters on June 27th.