Man, no wonder Timur Bekmambetov started talking about “Wanted 2” a week before this movie came out.
It’s been a rough summer for everybody, but Honest Abe really took it on the chin, making only $16 million this weekend. Reviews weren’t great either; most critics shredded it.
For our part, it’s a solid action movie. It’s actually quite a bit better than “Wanted”, story-wise, not least because Bekmambetov was clearly kept far, far away from the script. Similarly, Burton’s fingerprints are all over this: the movie plays out a lot like his beloved Hammer horror movies.
But at the same time, it doesn’t go nearly far enough with the concept. Bekmambetov actually tries to play this one seriously, and it doesn’t quite fit together. It’s too serious to be campy fun, yet too campy and too shallow to earn the gravity it tries to put to the proceedings. But it’s still a lot of fun, either way, and Bekmambetov can handle an action sequence.
What about you? What’d you think?