Many, to try to discredit modern films, allude to recovering an old essence of films that they confuse too much with a militant rancidity. Fortunately, there are people who are capable of doing old school stuff no need to smell like mothballs. The difference between being nostalgic and having a classic style that can be passed off as modern.
On the other hand, if there was so much desire for movies like those of yesteryear, hilarious gems like those made by Joe Carnahan would not go unnoticed. A few months ago he dropped by theaters with one of those films, the great ‘Assassin’s Game’, but unfairly overlooked. Now it’s time for it to get a well-deserved second chance with its arrival on Amazon Prime Video.
robbery at the police station
At the head of his fabulous play, with much of the powerful 70s thrillers with robberies and police stations like (obviously) ‘Assault on the 13th Precinct Police Station’, we have a cast of great players used to this type of film in which they fit wonderfully: Gerard Butler, Frank Grillo and other veterans like Toby Huss. We also have the young Alexis Louder showing promise for this kind of cinema.
The film begins with one of those unfortunate coincidences that occur in small towns in the movies. At the police station they receive the notice to arrest a man involved in a violent accident, but by bringing him to the premises they will end laying the foundation for a battlefield that will involve that man with a thousand faces (Grillo), the young police (Louder) and a hit man who arrives on the scene (Butler).
The main characters, as well as the string of colorful secondary characters that follow one another throughout the meeting, respond to quite a few archetypes, but even so they are written with a lot of care. Carnahan and his screenwriter Kurt McLeod create a series of situations where they can develop through foul-mouthed humor and cynicism as black as tar.
‘Assassin’s game’: the pocket novel that does not fail you
The duo also create an intricate structure to keep the characters’ intentions intrigued throughout the story, using the best resources of the pocket literature from which they also draw inspiration. That exquisite touch of pulp, his well-placed irreverent sense of humor and Carnahan’s expertise in filming sequences make this a really explosive and entertaining cocktail.
That kind of novel is always good to have on hand for a trip or a silly afternoon, because it never fails you. The same can be said of ‘Assassin’s Game’, but in terms of violent and light-hearted film.
Those longing for the wrong, hard-core kind of filmmaking might spend less time shouting to the skies for a Comanche to have her own action movie and supporting films like this than reclaiming what they’re supposedly wanting to recapture.
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