A moment of helplessness is something you never want to find yourself in. Especially in a situation where you could have helped, given the skills you have. This triggers a feeling of either rage or guilt that either makes you or breaks you. And for Patrick “H” Hill (Jason Statham), his moment of helplessness is when he loses his son Dougie (Eli Brown) during a robbery in progress, which both breaks him and makes him unleash the Wrath of Man.
H is a cold, mysterious stranger who is hired by a cash truck company responsible for moving hundreds of millions of dollars around Los Angeles each week. During one such job, the truck gets held up at gunpoint and H single-handedly deals with the robbers by showcasing highly combative skills, making him employee of the week. As the first layer of the story is peeled, we find out that H is there on a secret mission: to find the people responsible for his son’s death during similar robberies. And with his new job, he traps every robber in the city until he finds those robbers who were responsible for his son’s death.
Stories of revenge are always in popular demand. Given its structure of pure action entertainment, with a twist that comes way later in the movie, that puts our lead character in their most vulnerable state only to later unleash pure mayhem until the revenge is complete. Wrath of Man plays into that action movie mold beat by beat, while using time jumps to create the world and how brutal it is. Director Guy Ritchie uses every tool in his arsenal by making the story simmer properly especially with regards to H, his motivation which extends to his crew and how far they are willing to go for H in his pursuit of revenge and finding the people responsible for his son’s death.
The thing to appreciate about Wrath of Man is that it is not trying to glorify its use of violence or the world it is set in. In one particular sequence where H’s crew are rounding up every degenerate in the city to find the robbers, you see how the crew are repulsed by the things they see during their raids. And how rotten human beings can be. There is no mercy here. H is a man with a mission, his wrath is not to be stifled with. And Ritchie makes it damn sure in every step H takes.
Looking at the performances, Statham finds himself on familiar grounds, but with gentlemanly sophistication added to his traits. To put it simply, if Keanu Reeves’ John Wick can kill two men in a bar with a pencil, then Statham’s H definitely can kill a man just by staring at him. The silence in his character is more frightening than his use of combative skills. And as Holt McCallany’s character Bullet says, he is a dark fucking spirit. While Statham shines as his usual self, it is Scott Eastwood playing the antagonist Jan who challenges him in every possible way. Eastwood takes his character’s motivation of greed and pleasure and plays it with precision. He doesn’t overplay his character’s trait like many movies have done in the past, rather he plays it smooth with a level head and such integration that you want Statham’s H to just punch him in the face repeatedly.
Wrath of Man gives you everything that you need in a revenge-driven action movie. If you’re familiar with Ritchie’s filmography, you will be surprised by how different Wrath of Man is in terms of aesthetics. Ritchie lets the flow of the movie breathe properly, without any of his signature cuts or flashy images. With Statham in the mood for vengeance, with a mean stare and nothing-to-lose character, you will have a high time with Wrath of Man. Cheers!
