Key Takeaways
- Plot Overview: A former black ops team must execute a heist to save a kidnapped girl amidst city chaos.
- Performance Insights: Kate Beckinsale leads, but the film also highlights Lewis Tan’s fighting skills.
- Action Quality: The action sequences lack originality and fail to impress compared to Beckinsale’s previous work.
- Overall Impression: Despite its potential, Wildcat falls into formulaic territory with predictable elements.
Plot: An ex-black ops team reunites to pull off a desperate heist and save an eight-year-old girl’s life. They have only 12 hours to navigate the lethal streets amidst a citywide riot, pay a large ransom, and frame a dangerous criminal organization.
Review: Over the last few years, Kate Beckinsale has turned into the heir apparent to the Bruce Willis and John Travolta school of generic action movies. From spy flicks like Canary Black to revenge movies like Stolen Girl, Beckinsale has deviated from the big-budget Underworld franchise or the marquee period dramas she became synonymous with earlier in her career. The latest action vehicle Beckinsale is headlining is Wildcat. From the director of the Scott Adkins-starring One Shot movies, Wildcat is a heist movie that tries to emulate Guy Ritchie’s blend of humor and Cockney badassery. Unfortunately, despite some signs of potential, Wildcat is another formulaic paycheck featuring wasted performances from Lewis Tan and Alice Krige.
Set during a showdown between the London Police and gang factions that have turned the city into a war zone, Wildcat opens with a heist run by Ada (Kate Beckinsale) and Roman (Lewis Tan). Ada and Roman have a romantic history spanning ten years that hit a snag when she wanted a family, but he did not. In the present day, the former couple is forced to work together when Ada’s daughter, Charlotte (Isabelle Moxley), is kidnapped after Ada’s brother Edward (Rasmus Hardiker) is caught stealing from crime lord Frasier Mahoney (Charles Dance). The heist Ada orchestrates to pay back Frasier will be by stealing from Christina Vine (Alice Krige), the most powerful criminal in London. Ada and Roman enlist their special forces friend Curtis (Bailey Patrick) to help them steal under the cover of the riots in town, and that is when all hell breaks loose.
Immediately, Wildcat uses the Guy Ritchie formula of fast-talking Brits dropping slang and profanity in equal measure with quippy jokes and gunfire as they perpetrate a complex crime. The film then shifts to the competing plot threads that separate the characters from one another around town as they attempt to double- and triple-cross everyone in their path to escape unscathed. This means that while Roman tries to fence stolen jewels to gangster Finlay (Ed Kingsley) and Edward and Curtis hang with Curtis’ friend Galloway (Tom Bennett), Ada tries to get assistance from her former boss Cia (Mathilde Warnier), who runs an exclusive sex club. All of these storylines unfold at a rapid pace to create the illusion of momentum, but it serves as a confusing jumble of plot devices and clichés that instead feels formulaic and generic. In fact, it becomes immediately apparent that the creatives behind Wildcat could not decide whether they wanted this to be funny, thrilling, serious, or a mix of all of them, with the wildly shifting tone present from beginning to end.
While Kate Beckinsale does get top billing and the title refers to Ada’s legendary skills as a soldier and mercenary, Wildcat spends just as much time focused on Lewis Tan and his skills as a fighter. Almost every action sequence featuring Kate Beckinsale, where her face is obscured to disguise her stunt double, shows Tan front and center as he performs his own stunts. Tan is a talented stunt fighter, having showcased his abilities in Cobra Kai as well as the Mortal Kombat reboot; however, the repetitive look of the action sequences diminishes his impressive skills. Equally, Beckinsale has had a lot better action work in her career, with this movie coming in substantially below her recent action projects in terms of choreography and originality. For everyone else in the cast, their action work is relegated to gunplay, boasting tacked-on CGI blood that diminishes everything.
Written by Dominic Burns (credited as Dee Dee), Wildcat hits every trope of the British heist movie with the bumbling idiot, the giant neighbor, the clueless comic relief, the smart-talking villain dressed in a tracksuit, and countless others. Burns, who has an extensive career as a producer in addition to writing Madness in the Method, Allies, and Alien Uprising, does not offer much in terms of originality to Wildcat, as the twists and reveals are telegraphed, reducing their impact on the plot. In fact, the entire idea of London under siege by gangs feels unnecessary to the movie itself. Director James Nunn employed the conceit of a single take for his film One Shot, harkening back to his direct-to-digital model of action filmmaking, as seen in his work directing films in The Marine franchise, as well as Tower Block, Eliminators, and Shark Bait. Movies like Wildcat are often elevated by their sense of humor. Still, any levity we experience in the first half of the film quickly dissipates in the second half as the movie delves into more serious territory before attempting to shift back to humor. By that point, it is too little too late.
I am not going to complain about getting a solid action movie when one comes my way, but with so many choices out there, Wildcat represents yet another variation of the same story we have seen done before and done better. The action is flaccid, and there are too many story elements that fail to develop. The concept of a city under siege and a heist happening simultaneously could have been developed into a very cool movie. Still, the special forces angle, the sex club, the British gangsters, and the dynamic between Kate Beckinsale and Lewis Tan are all underutilized and never amount to anything to get excited about. Wildcat is named after an unpredictable and vicious animal; whereas this movie is easy to predict and lacks uniqueness.
Wildcat opens in theaters and on digital on November 25th.
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Source:
JoBlo.com
