September 18, 2010

Killers (2010)

2/5

Killers is such a stupid movie. When I first saw the trailer, I thought that it might be cool. As time went on and reviews came out, I got less and less excited for it. If I had just waited for my interest to dwindle to nothing, I might have spared myself from watching this stupid movie. It follows the awkward relationship that develops between awkward CIA agent Spencer (Kutcher) and awkward computer nerd Jen (Heigl) after awkwardly bumping into each other in France. Spencer is there to kill someone while Jen is there vacationing with her alcoholic mother (O'Hara) and overbearing father (Selleck). They get married and, several years later, Spencer discovers that a bounty has been placed on his head. All of his neighbors start attacking him with machine guns and kitchen knives like something out of Hot Fuzz, only bad. There are also a few side stories that are worthless and a final "twist" that would have been obvious if it made any sense.

Now that you know how stupid the plot is, I can tell you how stupid the rest of the movie is. The characters just don't work. At all. None of them. The two leads have absolutely no chemistry together; it's like they're talking cardboard cutouts. There was no passion, even in their arguments. There's very little romance and there's very little comedy (although the movie as a whole does provide some moments to laugh at, like the alcoholic mother, before you come to the depressing realization that alcoholism has become a punchline). The pacing is atrocious and the special effects are terrible. The gunfights and car chases failed to keep my attention (although the hand-to-hand combat was actually not bad). It's not the worst movie in the world, but I would seriously ask anybody who was intrigued by the trailer to just step away and let this one go. (The only reason it is not 1 star is that it didn't offend me in any way.)