The plots are about as predictable as a weather report in the Sahara Desert. Someone unwisely decides to anger a seemingly ordinary bald guy, unaware that he’s actually a former cop, soldier or highly-trained professional capable of dishing out unholy amounts of damage with his bare hands.
Cue 90 minutes of Statham growling and snarling his way through hordes of unnamed mooks, punching, kicking, shooting and stabbing them into submission.
For better or worse, his new film “Mutiny” doesn’t stray far from this tried-and-tested formula.
Unfortunately, this new thriller doesn’t quite reach the entertaining heights of his last outing, “The Beekeeper”, delivering only a handful of genuine thrills while remaining decidedly thin on plot and character.
In this Jean-Francois Richet-directed film, Statham plays Cole Reed, a former New York cop who has fallen from grace and now works in private security. He is employed by Tibu (Ramon Tikaram), a billionaire Thai shipping tycoon who is also a close friend and father figure.
As is often the fate of kindly friends and relatives of action-movie heroes, Tibu ends up brutally murdered, with Reed blamed for the crime. Reed flees, only to end up aboard the Artemis, one of Tibu’s cargo ships, where he encounters kind-hearted crewwoman Angie Ellis (Annabelle Wallis).
The last time Statham went to sea, in “The Meg” and “The Meg 2”, things went pretty well for him. Here, however, instead of giant sharks, he faces the all-too-real horror of human trafficking.
Some films might use such subject matter to explore themes of exploitation, corruption and the commodification of human lives. Mutiny, however, makes no pretensions of depth, using this issue largely as a backdrop to get Statham to punch and kick traffickers to justice.
And that’s the film, really!
Even at a sleek 95 minutes, the film slogs through its early acts, weighed down by exposition and explanations that ultimately feel unnecessary given how things turn out. It all feels like an unnecessarily convoluted excuse to get Statham onto a ship and fighting bad guys.
Its story is incredibly straightforward, with few twists or surprises. In a way, though, this lends Mutiny a certain old-school charm, making it feel like one of the B-grade martial arts flicks so popular in the ’80s and ’90s.
The cargo ship makes for an interesting action-movie setting, with its tight corridors and dimly-lit containers lending the fight scenes a suitably claustrophobic feel. Unfortunately, the film never exploits the setting to its full potential. Statham gamely dispatches his foes in a myriad of violent ways, but even these begin to feel repetitive after a while.
And character-wise… what character? The cast generally perform well as standard action movie archetypes.
Roland Møller delivers a mostly one-note performance as antagonist Captain Marko, whose main contribution to the film is a climactic showdown with Statham.
Wallis fares better as Ellis: in another film, she might have made for an interesting character, a single mother trying to do the right thing in a male-dominated world governed by cutthroat ethics. Here, however, she is mostly relegated to sidekick duties.
And Statham? You have to admire the man for his consistency, playing roughly the same character in almost every film. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, given how entertainingly he does it. Complaining about his roles is like complaining about fast food: you know exactly what you’re getting, and that’s largely the point.
So overall, Mutiny ends up a little bit lost at sea. Statham fans will probably enjoy this one, and there is enough action set pieces to keep things moving. But compared with the star’s better outings, it ultimately feels a little underwhelming: a paint-by-numbers action flick that never quite makes the splash it should.
As of press time, ‘Mutiny’ is screening in cinemas nationwide.