#The protege movie#
Sure, a B movie made by A-level talent can sometimes (often?) transcend its limitations, but sometimes you just get a solid little B movie. The Protégé is an old-school studio programmer that thrives on old-fashion star power, a screenplay that’s just twisty enough and set pieces from a man whose faces deserves to be carved alongside (offhand) Cameron, Bay, Singleton, Bigelow, Verhoeven, Woo and McTiernan on the new-wave action movie Mount Rushmore. The film’s finale barely even tries to offer up a conventional action climax, and while I appreciated the emphasis on conversation over stunt work, the film’s endgame is a little arbitrary and anti-climactic.Įven if the eventual destination leaves a little to be desired, then there’s still plenty of polished pulp to be found in the journey. The film loses some steam in its third act as you realize it has already left most of its cards on the table.
She bounces well off of Jackson, and she has a real spark with Keaton (who gets quite a few moments to flex his and/or his stuntman’s action chops), but it’s the three of them alone that provide 94% of the film’s entertainment value. The biggest “difference” is that, again, it’s lighter, looser and less naval-gazing than most hit woman/spy gal pics.Īlso helping is that The Protégé doesn’t treat its female protagonist like a #Girlboss statement, instead just telling a story where its lead action hero happens to be a woman. As such, The Protégé lacks the “Well, this is different” sensibility of Jackie Chan’s R-rated political revenge in The Foreigner or Mel Gibson’s “one last ride” fatalism in Edge of Darkness. has played in this sandbox a few times before (six seasons on CW’s Nikita, for example). The action we get is, per usual, polished, accomplished, shot and edited for maximum clarity and fully aware of the grim consequences, but it’s also nothing to write home about. We get plenty of violence, although honestly much of it feels like a distraction or a commercial obligation alongside the more character-specific scenes which seem where Campbell and writer Richard Wenk’s interests lie. None of this is more than surface deep, but the playful antagonism provides a welcome change of pace from the expected revenge tropes and run-and-gun action. Rembrandt is more aggressive about the courtship than Anna, although Anna isn’t exactly appalled by the advances. is gorgeous and Michael Keaton is still a stud at 69 (nice), it’s no surprise that both fancy-pants, trivia-spouting mercenaries take a liking to each other.
#The protege professional#
While the marketing sells Michael Keaton as the primary antagonist, he’s actually a professional stuck in the middle of this chaos as a professional problem solver employed by the bad guys. For reasons best explained by the movie, the first act ends with Moody gunned down in his own bathtub.Īnna isn’t thrilled about this development, and the rest of the film concerns her investigations into the who, what and why of Moody’s death. Moody, on his last legs due to an unnamed illness (he’s got a “movie death cough,” which is all you need to know), is the introspective and remorseful one, although some of his monologues about being a righteous assassin who only targets bad guys but knows he too is a villain makes him like the more introspective cousin of Darius Kincaid from The Hitman’s Bodyguard.
Those two factors alone set it apart from almost any female assassin movie you can think of.
This is a rare lady assassin flick that isn’t drowning in despair, about its heroine trying to escape the life and/or about its “bad ass” protagonist protecting a child.
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