The reality is simple: when you sign up for Jason Statham, you GET Jason Statham. One of the last true action stars of our generation, Statham knows what he does best and rarely deviates from his day job of kicking ass and collecting checks. I’d argue he’s actually best as a comedic actor and doesn’t get enough roles to showcase his pretty solid comedic timing, but like clockwork he returns in “A Working Man,” another action thriller that reunites him with David Ayer (“Suicide Squad“) in a role that feels as workmanlike as the title would suggest. This is becoming a sort of annual tradition for both men, and despite my misgivings on this latest outing, I’m perfectly ok if we get one of these to start every year from now on. Though “A Working Man” possesses all of the staples you want when you sit down for this sort of thing, it is unfortunately a lesser effort than last year’s “The Beekeeper,” largely due to its tediously long runtime and bogged down, convoluted story.
Where “The Beekeeper” (the first pairing of Statham and Ayer) is a tight, ridiculous take on the old premise of retired rogue agent being brought back into the fold to avenge someone, “A Working Man” caves in on itself with too many subplots and needless characters in an attempt to add depth to a character framework that simply doesn’t need one. This film should be simple: Statham is a badass dude living a quiet life, something happens to someone he cares about, and the bone breaking, gun totting, unkillable animal is unleashed from his cage to kill Russians. Honestly, if that was all “A Working Man” was it would be a great time at the movies and be exactly what we asked for. Instead, it poorly tries to give us everything and nothing at the same time. Ayer indulges in all of his best and worst tendencies and adds far too many characters who’s purposes amount to nothing in the end, attempting to layer and contextualize villains who are all but caricatures of early 90s villains.
Statham plays Levon Cade, an ex-military special ops bad ass who now lives a quiet life working construction for the Garcia family. They have accepted him as one of their own, and Cade is seen as a loving uncle to their daughter Jenny (Arianna Rivas) who looks up to Cade. Of course, Jenny goes out with her friends and his kidnapped by a Russian human trafficking ring. And like clockwork, Levon clocks out of his day job, puts down the hard hat and hive viz vest to pick up his bag of weapons to go after the bad guys one by one to bring Jenny home. Along the way, we learn that he also has a daughter of his own, whom he is fighting for custody of from his now deceased wife’s father who inexplicably hates him. The Russian ring also has deep familial bloodlines, a war council drug dealers, jumpsuit wearing Tweedledee and Tweedledum twins, and kidnappers that all belong to a brotherhood but all seem to operate independently. Oh, and there’s a random biker gang that somehow gets roped into things. Oh, and the kidnappers are a couple with a very weird dynamic and aren’t really a part of the family, but are? “A Working Man” is a loose adaption of novel called “Levon’s Trade” by prolific comic-book writer Chuck Dixon. It is written and directed by David Ayer and written and produced by Sylvester Stallone. Yes, THAT Sylvester Stallone.
Even it’s synopsis – which honestly doesn’t even cover the random cameo from David Harbour as his old war buddy or the other war buddy working for an unnamed police force or the random police officers who also work for the Russian mob – “A Working Man” spreads itself far too thin to be the no holds barred action thriller it should be. The sprawling narrative undercuts all of the tension as it manically cuts to the next scene right as something becomes interesting. Statham shines when he’s beating up bad guys, and the action combo of Ayer and Statham seems to be getting better and better as they pair up. But “A Working Man” never gives us enough of what we want to be as thrilling as it should, and feels far too self serious for something narratively unremarkable by design. I keep coming back to “The Beekeeper,” but that’s because they are basically the same film. Or at least, they should be, with the former able to recognize its silliness and let their star mow down nameless henchmen in creative ways. At least with “The Beekeeper,” every villain was dumb on purpose, which adds to the joy of watching them get absolutely wrecked.
“A Working Man” removes these thrills with the tedium of half baked world building, none of which end up mattering all that much to final result and make you feel the run time about half way through. When there’s action, it’s exciting and exactly why you come to these things. But it happens so rarely and starts and stops with such mediocre entry points that “A Working Man” feels like a mundane Monday office job instead of a half day on a Friday heading to Vegas for the weekend. It works too hard to be something its not and frankly shouldn’t be, and only comes alive in the brief moments when it goes for broke and let’s the bullets reign.
This is probably more than needs to be said about “A Working Man.” You’re either on board for this or you’re not, and these kinds of things should exist without complication or necessity. They don’t need a point and that’s the point, the pinnacle of a popcorn flick that Statham is usually so good at delivering when he’s given the opportunity to do so. “A Working Man” holds him back in a lot of ways, feeling more repetitive than fun and forcing him to sludge through a large amount of detective work that neither Statham nor both writers have the patience or are suited for.
There’s some fun to be had with “A Working Man,” but it’s not the best of its kind for this kind of film and we’re probably better off placing our hopes on “The Beekeeper 2: Electric Boogaloo” and I’m sure we’ll get “A Working Man: Clocking in Again” at some point.
Just let Statham work and I’ll be seated for all of them.
Rating: 3 out of 5 Stars
“A Working Man” is now playing in theaters. You can watch the trailer below.
