Killer Instincts

Just watched "Wanted" this recent Saturday. It was quite a thrill ride to watch. It was a film adaptation of Mark Millar's "Wanted" limited series, though with a water down treatment done to it to make it servicable as a film. It still got the revenge porn elements in it which was integral in the comics.

Kazakhstan-born director Timur Bekmambetov, of Night Watch and Day Watch fame, puts his own touch into the film. James McAvoy plays Wesley Gibson, neurotic account manager who happens be the son of the original Killer, the world's premiere assasin. Angelina Jolie plays the role of Fox (Killer's lover in the comic version). Morgan Freeman plays Sloan, leader of the Fraternity and the Killer's closest friend.

The premise of the movie shifted from a world controlled by supervillains towards a secret society of assasin who keeps the balance by following their kill orders from a Loom of Fate and they decipher the weave for the name of the target.

The movie starts with Wesley Gibson six weeks ago as a corporate drone called an account manager where plods through a dead end existence alongside the unknowing fact that his girlfriend is having an affair with his best friend. That all soon changed when he gets approached by Fox and he become immersed into the shadowy world of the Fraternity upon meeting as well Sloan, his father's closest associate. Wesley gets to be a changed person when he talks down his supervisor, smacked his best friend with a keyboard straight onto his face and leaving his girlfriend. to start anew as a Fraternity member.

He goes through the grueling lessons of becoming a hardened killer in the tools of violence, the desensitization to it and the intricacies of Fraternity history and its kill roll. He gets to learn a bit of Fox's history and motivation when he undergone his first outing and kill before it ultimately leads to killing the assasin of his father, which later turns out to his real father. Quite an 180 plot twist of what's going on.

Wesley discovers the truth in which Sloan has been changing the targets which were designated by the weave wherein him and all the members of the Fraternity have been listed to be "retired". The most impressive piece of this movie is when Wesley assaulted the Fraternity HQ by sending in explosive loaded rats and then a major storm through the textile factory which makes the Hall of Mirrors scene in Equilibrium pale in comparison. I mean Wesley just shoots away and grabs guns when the ones he shoots goes empty, all without breaking beat or stride. Its like a mega-chain of combo moves for a fighting/shooting game to rack a lot of points/kills. The facedown between Wesley and Sloan was a bit long since the revelation was in order as to Sloan's motivation. It was rather surprising to here Morgan Freeman, aka Easy Reader from The Electric Company show to say the MF'er bomb. Fox having been loyal to the code of the Fraternity did the only honorable thing, she executed an extended arcing shot that went the entire 360 perimeter of the room they're in, which kills those in its path as well as her in the process. The chase for Sloan comes to an end when he got away from Wesley but Sloan got what he deserved when he gets lulled into vulnerability by a decoy standin for Wesley and gets sniped from quite a distance like how his faux father was killed at the start of the film. The film ends there without little much to guess what Wesley would do with his life since the Fraternity is no more. In the case of the comic, it was pretty much resolved.

Its a thrill ride of a movie to watch and it might be an eyeopener for those of us in the area of deadend jobs, meekly living and having friends who cheat on you. It quite a movie to watch for sure and possibly enough to warrant at least a second watch. :)