Ang Lee is a wizard of a moviemaker. From his envelope pushing work on Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon to The Life of Pi, the man is obsessed with new technology and its ability to enhance his righteous storytelling sensibilities. Problem is, his last two efforts, Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk and Gemini Man (out today)—were both marvels of technical achievements that lacked story sentiments that result in an emotive connection between audience and the characters who inhabit the big screen.
Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk actually did a better job of pulling us in (perhaps it was the subject matter) than his Will Smith starring actioner that could not be flatter if it tried. That is saying something, given the film’s premise and the stellar performers who comprise his ensemble.
Gemini Man follows Henry Brogan (Will Smith), a government assassin who is among the best at his job. Put it this way, the film opens with Henry on his belly, sniper’s rifle at the ready. A few miles away on some railroad tracks, a European high speed train is careening towards him. His assignment … take out a passenger sitting by the window as it passes at around 143 MPH. Sounds impossible, but Henry’s handlers would not have put him in the position if they didn’t believe he could succeed.
It’s an impressive first scene and illustrates what exactly we as the audience are dealing with and that moment, however short, serves as a perfectly executed means of introducing a character that will be in the back of our collective minds as the film progresses.
Henry, after that, retires. After 70-plus kills, he has had enough and is more than ready to kick back and watch the grass grow. Thing is, that guy on the speeding train was no Russian terrorist (as he was told) and even if Henry was done with the job, the job isn’t done with him. Not necessarily the most original of baseline plots, but Lee as the Oz of this operation has something special to work with from the script by Game of Thrones scribe David Benioff, as well as Billy Ray and Darren Lemke.
No one knows you better than you know yourself. Wait, what does that have to do with the price of tea in China. Clive Owen’s Clay Verris is charged with cleaning up the mess that that hit produced and he has an ace in the hole in the perceived to be impossible task of removing Henry from the land of the living. Two decades prior, he took a blood sample from Henry and cloned him. Yup, and now he’s all grown up and charged with killing … himself. Of course, he does not know this, and Clay is hoping that the erasing of an individual happens at a distance, so questions do not get asked. Of course, we’ve already established that Henry is the best so Junior (the young Will Smith) has his work cut out for him as the duo cross the globe in a game of cat and mouse that at times has us wondering which Smith is the cat and which Smith is the mouse.
It can work and sometimes it doesn’t work. In this case, there may have been too many chefs in the kitchen, aka the writer’s room. The script isn’t crisp, doesn’t pop like an actioner should with this kind of premise and pedigree. Too many moments fluctuate between feeling forced, possessing a lack of thought being put into them, and just plain lazy. Henry and Junior are on a collision course, that much we can discern pretty easily. It’s just that when they finally do get mano-a-mano, there is not a whole lot of punch to the power. The elder Smith plays Henry like the veteran soldier he is, and as such one can infer that there is a whole lot of cognitive processes that go into everything he does, and most importantly—everything he says. The younger Smith, aka Junior, his dialogue (and actions for that matter) are stiff, dare we say boring, and above all else, just flat. The technology may be there, but it still feels robotic. Sure, Junior has been raised by Clay to be a soldier and to never question orders. He is like a machine, but even in scenes where Junior and Henry are face-to-face, the younger character seems to lack any curiosity whatsoever into this utter mind-blowing situation that he finds himself in. Strangely, it is not the tech that feels distracting, it’s the words that come out of Junior’s mouth and the manner with which he carries himself that never quite clicks correctly.
Meanwhile, there is a solid ensemble surrounding Smith vs. Smith. Most notably is the always awesome Mary Elizabeth Winstead, who plays an agent who Henry’s boss (who clearly does not appreciate how his (former) charge is being treated after decades of impeccable and loyal service) sends to keep an eye on him early in our story. Henry makes Winstead’s Danny Zakarweski almost immediately. Strangely, she doesn’t seem too concerned or overly upset that her cover has been blown. It’s treated like an, “oh well, guess I’ll just help you now” type of moment … i.e. very un-military.
Owen is solid enough, but his Clay is not given much, if any, of a backstory for audiences to grab onto. Even worse, his character never provides any remote reasoning in terms of providing answers to questions such as, “why does Clay do what he does?” There’s this whole, muddied, “Gemini Project” element, which is explained (minutely) throughout and still could not tell you why they exist and to what end they even do what they do.
It’s frustrating, honestly, because it goes without saying that Oscar winner Lee is a supreme talent and one of the greatest visual storytellers working today. He is gifted beyond belief with his ability to take prose, bring it to life in a manner that is as visually stunning as it is enriching on a personal level. I mean, this is the guy who gave us Brokeback Mountain, Sense and Sensibility and The Ice Storm. Perhaps the script completely failed him? If that is the case, then he should have had his trio of writers head back to work until the prose caught up with the technology that the wizard is wielding. Besides frustrating, it’s utterly disappointing. Smith is game for this and does everything he can to carry a movie on his shoulders. Sadly, everything behind the camera seems to have failed him on every level.
Grade: C