Wanted

Imagine a movie that's one part Karate Kid, one part The Matrix, and you have Wanted.

Wanted starts out with a black screen and small text giving us the back story. "1,000 years ago, a group of weavers formed a society of assassins..."

Hold the phone.
WEAVERS?

I kid you not. The fate of the world as we know it rests in the hands of sweater makers. How's that for gripping backstory? Weavers. Leather tanners I might believe, but weavers? Tee, hee. I still can't get over it. But wait, there's more...you see, a loom weaves out encrypted messages telling the weaver assassins who they must kill next. Go ahead, re-read that previous sentence. Take it all in. Death by textile. You might never look at your cotton t-shirts in the same way.

So it goes without saying that you need a fair suspension of disbelief to enjoy Wanted. And it's not an unenjoyable action film. It's a fairly non-stop assault of high testosterone action and violence, but there's nothing that will feel too new.

James McAvoy stars as the Karate Kid -- er -- Wesley Gibson, a miserable office drone who learns his father was the world's top assassin. He's drawn into the assassin's training ground in order to train to take down his father's killer.

His training involves a lot of bloody fighting montage scenes and a lot of slow-motion bullets whizzing Matrix-style around impossible angles. It also involves a lot of the surly assassin Fox, played by Angelina Jolie. I'd be pretty surly too if I hadn't eaten anything resembling food in the last six months. Seriously, did they have craft services on that set? Couldn't somebody at least maybe have spooned some broth into her mouth? She's still a knockout but girlfriend was looking pretty bony and haggard in this film.

If you're looking for pure action, you'll enjoy the movie, even if much of it so unrealistic and improbable, you'll find yourself giggling through it. James McAvoy was an interesting casting choice because he's completely against archetype for action hero. I think the boy can actually act, but he just didn't get much a chance to do it here. But hey, he does save humanity from a killer scarf maker, so no complaints.

Week 46: Atonement

Hurrah! The new TV is finally playing nicely with the DVD player! So, it turns out the idiots at the Motley Queue household simply had to press a weird button in the nether regions of the remote control to get the DVD player to talk to the TV, but what's new?

We kicked off the new TV with a ceremonial viewing of Atonement. I have to brag here and add that I read the book YEARS before it was an inkling in a movie director's mind. Suck it, Oprah. It's a phenomenal book and perfect stuff to be translated to the screen...

...and then they cast Kiera Knightly. Sigh.

I know, I know. She's very easy on the eyes. She's spunky. She's spirited. But she's also whiny, nasal and fairly unskilled at the art of subtlety. I felt like I was watching a spoiled American teenager giving a bad British impersonation. I want somebody to feed her a cheeseburger and teach her how to stop sneering so much.

If anything saves the movie it's Knightly's talented co-stars including James McAvoy who very nearly drips with good-boy charm. And that little girl playing young Briony was like a freakishly small and precocious version of Jodie Foster. We'll be seeing more of her, I'm sure.

Unfortunately, I'm sure we'll be seeing more of Kiera Knightly as well. Still, if you haven't seen the movie you should rent it. It's worth a viewing. Better yet, read the book.