Review: Wild Card

Nick Wild (Jason Statham) has a dream: to make $500K and sail off into the Mediterranean sunset. It may be a loser's dream, what with him working odd jobs as a security consultant in Sin City and only too willing to let the blackjack tables fleece him out of whatever money he does have.

Nick's a stand-up guy though, the type who'll play patsy for a strength-challenged friend so he can impress his hotsy-totsy gal (Sofia Vergara). So when Holly (Dominik García-Lorido) finds herself on the receiving end of a brutal beatdown and dumped from a limo in front of the hospital, she knows exactly who to call to help her get her revenge. Except Nick isn't too keen on tracking down her attacker, especially when he finds out that he's staying at the Golden Nugget. The Golden Nugget is owned by Baby (a deliciously amusing Stanley Tucci), who's a very big deal in this mob-owned town; he tried recruiting Nick back in the day but Nick refused, and the two have maintained a friendly but distant relationship.

Holly guilts him - the things that were done to her and, by the way, who was there for Nick when he was at rock bottom? - and Nick tracks down the culprits: pretty boy mobster Danny DeMarco (Milo Ventimiglia) and his goons Tiel and Kinlaw (Chris Browning and Matthew Willig), all of whom Nick immobilises and ties up so that Holly can swagger in with a pair of garden shears to play her own game on DeMarco.

Director Simon West, who previously teamed up with Statham on The Mechanic and The Expendables 2, heralds the action with the heretofore complacent Statham in slow-mo, and soon enough legs are kicked in, foreheads sliced with a credit card, and DeMarco is knocked unconscious reeling from contact with a coin. Choreographer Corey Yuen (The Transporter series) stages two additional set pieces - both as detailed and well-executed as the first.

Be forewarned: Wild Card is not a full-on Statham actioner. It functions more as a character piece, and there is ample downtime between the action sequences. It's also a bit of a hodgepodge - going from vigilante flick to odd couple buddy movie (Michael Angarano co-stars as millionaire Cyrus Kinnick who wants Nick to be his Mister Miyagi) to lightweight noir. The venerable William Goldman (Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid) adapted his novel Heat, which he had already adapted once before for the 1986 Burt Reynolds flick of the same title. While sub-par Goldman is still head and shoulders above the average screenwriter, there's no hiding the fact that the movie feels cobbled together, with the various elements failing to congeal into cohesion.

Statham is a naturally intense and charismatic presence, so he will always catch your attention even when he's not in kickass mode. He handles himself well in his character's more brooding moments, and even manages to convince as the recessive, down on his luck hero before he goes full Statham.

Wild Card

Directed by: Simon West

Written by: William Goldman, adapted from his novel Heat

Starring: Jason Statham, Dominik García-Lorido, Michael Angarano, Milo Ventimiglia, Stanley Tucci, Hope Davis, Anne Heche, Sofia Vergara, Jason Alexander