1 day Ago By Ben Hathaway
Angelina Jolie and James McAvoy in WantedTimur Bekmambetov’s Wanted, based on the Top Cow comic miniseries by writer Mark Millar and artist J. G. Jones, hit theaters in the middle of the Summer 2008 movie season.
It was a crowded one, especially for superhero movies, with Iron Man, The Incredible Hulk, Hancock, Hellboy II: The Golden Army, and The Dark Knight all hitting theaters within three months. And yet, Wanted did quite well for itself (to the point, surprisingly, the planned sequel never came to fruition), becoming something of a counterprogramming hit against the more traditional PG-13 comic book fare. Even still, out of those aforementioned movies, it’s probably the one that has since left the general audience’s memory the most (outside perhaps Hancock, and deservedly so in that case).
It’s a shame because the movie is a lot of fun to this day. With great chemistry between leads James McAvoy and Angelina Jolie (both of them in their first but not final comic book movie) and memorable set-pieces, it’s a well-aged 110 minutes.What Is Wanted About?james mcavoy, common, and angelina jolie in wantedWanted follows McAvoy’s Wesley Allan Gibson, a bored office clerk who suffers regret over his life choices and abuse from his even more miserable boss on a daily basis.
He’s convinced himself that he appreciates the routine nature of his life because it’s safe when, in fact, it’s killing his mind and making him feel more and more disassociated from those around him.That all changes when he meets Jolie’s Fox, seemingly by accident, in a grocery store. But when a man Gibson doesn’t recognize (apparently) tries to kill him in that store, Fox springs into action and rescues the office clerk in an intense shoot-out.
She tells Gibson not only that his father (with whom Gibson had next to no familiarity) is dead, but was an assassin, and the same man who killed his father (AKA Cross) is now after him.[RELATED: James McAvoy Reveals He Nearly Passed Out Filming Surprising Scene in Wanted]Fox brings Gibson to what is, on the surface level, an abandoned factory. In reality, it’s an assassin training facility, overseen by the assassin group’s leader, Mr.
Sloan (Morgan Freeman in a very much against-type performance). They request he do things that, in his mind, are impossible, e.g.
, shoot the wings off of a fly and make a bullet curve around a huge slab of meat.Oscillating between wanting to go back to his boring life and embracing this “Fraternity,” Gibson ultimately decides to dive all-in and get revenge on the man who murdered his father. Sloan shows Gibson the “Loom of Fate,” a device that provides the names of those who will make the world an infinitely worse place.
Once your name comes up, you must be taken out.The thing is, the “Fraternity” is all essentially a lie by this point. For centuries, it was an organization that did exactly what Sloan said it did.
But, after it was put under Sloan’s thumb, everything went off the rails at a very specific point. Specifically, when the “Loom” spelled out the necessary demise of none other than Sloan himself. Since then, it’s been cover-up time, with the knowledgeable Cross being the primary target before he can spill the beans.
The reason Sloan has orchestrated everything so it’s Gibson who takes Cross out? Cross is, in fact, Gibson’s father.What’s impressive about Bekmambetov’s film is that it took a niche product and brought it into the mainstream. It did well with both critics and general audiences of just about every demographic thanks to its rapid-fire pacing, charming performances, and the general concept of low-profile, high-talent assassins (before John Wick did much the same).
Wanted also did quite a bit to expand McAvoy’s profile in the United States, showing him to be a performer who could successfully lead a big-budget studio film. Prior to this, he received some exposure as Mr. Tumnus in The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and the Oscar darlings The Last King of Scotland (2006) and Atonement (2007).
Wanted was what put him on the path to playing Charles Xavier in X-Men: First Class and its three sequels. As for Jolie, she starred in Eternals 13 years later, but given that film’s critical and commercial failure, it’s likely that she will end up being an MCU one-and-done.Stream Wanted on Max.
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