American Assassin (18)

The movie opens with a shot of our eponymous hero Mitch Rapp (Dylan O’Brien, ‘The Maze Runner’) on holiday with his wife to be, enjoying the sun, sand and cocktails. When suddenly they are attacked by a group of gun wielding terrorists, they open fire at everyone and anyone on the beach, leaving a blood trail of destruction and horror behind them.

Its 18 months later when we see Mitch Rapp again now toting a beard and the mental and physical scars of the tragedy. He is training himself up to infiltrate and to take on the terrorist group that attacked him and his fiancé alone when he is approached by the CIA agent Irene Kennedy (Sanaa Lathan). Kennedy then assigns Cold War veteran Stan Hurley (Michael Keating) to train Mitch, and later on together they and their team begin a mission to stop the terrorist’s group next plot. But can Mitch keep his emotions in check long enough to stop himself jeopardising the mission and taking justice into his own hands.

I found American Assassin to have a great pace and lots of action throughout with some of the fight scenes reminiscent of the ‘Bourne’ films, the amount of violence is excessive in parts where I found myself wincing or watching through half closed eyes, in particular the torture scene (but then it is supposed to be uncomfortable). The movie to an extent blurs the lines of who the terrorists are as we see the CIA cut through parts of Europe and leaving a lot of collateral damage behind them as they continue their at ‘all cost’ mission to stop the next terrorist attack. Adequately acted throughout by the cast and nice to see David Suchet as CIA Director Stansfield.

3/5

Ronan Sandford

 

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