The Screen Scribe

I think we can all agree that Jason Statham is an iconic action actor, yes? Reliable, stoic, athletic, delivering entertaining if somewhat predictable action films with his usual sense of wry humor for nigh on 25 years now? Yes? Agreed? Good. Because unfortunately, A Working Man is most definitely not a Statham classic. At best, it’s a poor man’s Taken. Though it began with some promise after a rather amusing opening fight scene that saw Statham’s character, Levon Cade, deliver an ass kicking utilising an array of construction materials and equipment, that was about as exciting and inventive as it got. And unfortunately, with a bloated runtime of two hours, it was not nearly as brief as this review is going to be.

Now generally I would give a detailed, none spoilery summary of the plot, but to be quite honest the plot is so formulaic I can break it down to less than three sentences. Former military man Levon Cade, now a construction worker with family issues, is tasked with tracking and rescuing his boss/friends daughter, Jenny, when she is kidnapped. Dusting off his black ops murder skills, Levon works his way through the Russian underworld of Chicago searching for Jenny and violent shenanigans ensue in typical Statham fashion. Oh, got it done in two. That’s literally the plot, and while I’m usually a big fan of the simple plot for action movies, this really just lacks any meat whatsoever.

Directed by David Ayer of Suicide Squad and Beekeeper fame, both of which had their flaws but were ultimately an entertaining two hours of escapism, A Working Man is threadbare in most departments but especially in the one department you can usually expect a Statham film to guarantee: over-the-top, ridiculous and spectacular action. Having achieved this in their previous collaboration on The Beekeeper I’m somewhat surprised that Ayer has failed to utilise Statham appropriately because let’s face it, we love the man, and while he is never going to win an Oscar, you can be damn sure he will kick a man through a wall and look good doing it. But we rarely see any such flair here. The action feels perfunctory, by the numbers and bland. There is never any tension as Statham strolls through brawls and gunfights without so much as a scratch. The dialogue is often hammy and overly serious at the same time, never striking the correct tone for what it’s trying to achieve. The subplots involving Cade’s daughter and his own supposed PTSD are never explored beyond the first half an hour which adds to the runtime without any payoff. And don’t even get me started on the chrome biker throne.

Now I’ve rattled off a fair number of issues so far, and I would love to balance that with some positives as I am a massive Statham fan, but they are sparse. Jenny was at times a nice turn from the usual damsel in distress trope but played it too hard by the end when she was kicking ass nearly better than Statham. But her character and the performance were enjoyable nonetheless. Statham delivered his usual stoic, mysterious broken man with a military history performance, though it felt a bit more restrained than usual, and minus his usual dry wit and wry sense of humour.

Overall, A Working Man feels like a parody of a Jason Statham action flick that just happened to star Jason Statham. While I wasn’t exactly bored watching it, I felt let down after an intriguing trailer buoyed my hopes of a decent action flick to offset a tame start to the Hollywood calendar year.

2 / 5 ⭐ from the Screen Scribe.