They don’t put directors on movie posters anymore. Now it’s just stars or startling imagery, something that the studio marketing teams feel will put butts in the seats. There was a time when you could see Alfred Hitchcock gracing his posters for Psycho, and the logic was simple: Hitchcockian suspense was the star.
Wanted is faced with an interesting dilemma. While it’s obvious that any movie featuring Angelina Jolie should feature her striking looks on posters as often as possible, the real star of the movie – the actual reason to see it – is director Timur Bekmambetov.
Bekmambetov adapted novels about vampires into Night Watch, Day Watch, and soon, Twilight Watch; it is the most successful Russian film series of all time. In those films, as in Wanted, it’s the remarkable visuals and the pristine choreography of seemingly reckless stunts that quicken our pulse and keep us glued to the screen for whatever’s coming.
But what lifts Wanted and Bekmambetov’s vampire franchise above the rest of the action-packed, high energy movies wreaking havoc on major cities and multiplexes alike is the way his action plays within his stories. In most cases, big budget movie stunts rarely rely on the story or enhance it in any way. Wanted is a great example of how the universe its story creates sets up the action sequences that power it.
Wesley Gibson (James McAvoy) has anxiety attacks when the frustratingly boring nature of his life catches up with him. He works in a cubicle under the thumb of a tyrant, and less than ten feet away from his best friend, who happens to be sleeping with Wesley’s girlfriend.
Circling the drain, Wesley is in the drugstore when he meets Fox (Angelina Jolie). That alone would get anyone’s attention. Fox tells him that she knew his father, odd since Wesley’s dad walked out when he was a week old. Fox has the real story, however — his father was an assassin killed days earlier by a gunman now stalking Wesley over on aisle four.
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Article comments
1 - SHad(o)W
ONE AWSOME movie
2 - tna
some time u think that u r a minded man but in my views its over
3 - Fran
Yes, an excellent movie. Thanks for the review! Very well done and gave some connections I hadn't realized between actors, and especially Timur Bekmambetov.
I have enjoyed everything I have seen that Timur Bekmambetov has done. A name I will definitely be keeping an eye on when looking for new movies to watch.