The Contractor (2022) Lately, I'm given to much musing when semi-dozing through a worthless, throwaway movie like this one......
Why does this movie even exist? Who even wanted it made? And why?
How did the producers scrape together enough money to finance it? A tax dodge? A money laundering scheme?
Who, besides the immediate families of the cast and crew who worked on it, did anyone think would care enough to sit through it? (Minus, of course, we hardy film bloggers)
Just wondering.......
I suppose the screenwriter (whose name isn't worth including here) thought he came up with a crackerjack idea. Take a typical flashback sequence from a Jason Bourne movie (or any other Black Ops commando thing) - the clandestine raid gone bloodily awry - and make an entire movie out of it, stretched out to a full length 103 minutes.
To pad out the running time, this script first drags out our hero's depressing backstory to the point where you wonder if it's a slow-as-molasses family drama instead of an action movie.....
James Harper (Chris Pine), a battle-worn Army Ranger is kicked out of the military for treating his combat damaged knee with too many unauthorized pain killers. A fellow ex-Ranger (Ben Foster) offers him the opportunity to to join him as part of a highly paid unofficial mercenary force.
The leader of these secret soldiers (Kiefer Sutherland) supposedly answers only the highest government authority, sending out his team to...uh....neutralize threats to National Security across the globe. But to Pine, he makes it sound like all they do is babysit corporate bigwigs.
Then, at long last, we come the movie's main reason for existence - the "Clandestine Raid Gone Bloodily Awry".
Nothing transpires that you haven't seen in literally a hundred other movies in this genre. And since "The Contractor" contains nothing else to offer and nowhere else to go, the perpetual gun duels serve the same purpose as showing Pine's protracted, sad family life - to interminably squeeze out the running time to feature film length.
What a complete and utter waste of Pine, Foster, Sutherland and the two other talented cast members here - Gillian Jacobs as Pine's long suffering wife and Eddie Marson as a weary safe-house operative.
Not to mention a total waste of time for anyone who stumbles upon this movie. I still can't explain why this movie exists, and the best thing do......pretend it doesn't. Zero stars (0).
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