Hummingbird
aka Redemption
(2013)
The Stat’s back and this time he’s baring his soulful,
sensitive side amidst the usual skull-cracking. Steven Knight, a talented
writer whose early credits on The Detectives
shouldn’t necessarily be held against him, makes his directorial debut (as many
dissatisfied writers are wont to do eventually) on Hummingbird, and it’s a mixed bag. Knight seems to be fully
engaging with his archetypes, but does so to the point that his tale is doused
in clichés. Material so self-consciously heightened requires a director and
stars who can make a virtue out of the excesses; that everyone here is merely
competent lays bare the overwrought corniness at its core.
Alternatively, perhaps Knight has just been lucky that the
likes of David Cronenberg (Eastern
Promises) and Stephen Frears (Dirty
Pretty Things) have shepherded his previous London-set thrillers to the
screen. Promises has a number of
things in common with Hummingbird,
not least the strong silent man of idiosyncratic morals working for the mob and
on a mission that requires him to weave a path through the corrupt underbelly
of the city. But Eastern Promises
etched out a genuinely tense and dangerous scenario, and one with twists in its
tail. What you see is what you get with Hummingbird;
Stat comes on the balding hairy homeless man before transforming into the shiny
bald bruising machine we all love. He’s tortured, drowning his sorrows and PTSD
in drink; the picture provides an over-explanatory flash back to the root of
Stat’s “Joey Jones” current problems
but Knight’s choices of military service (Afghanistan) and drone strikes feels
manipulative and cynical. And worse, crushingly obvious. At least the era of
haunted ‘Nam vet had some resonance (until Stallone showed up to take part). Movies
appropriating the Middle Eastern conflicts seem to be united in portraying
(heroically) troubled ex-soldiers, fully ripped, who slot into a all-purpose
action roles. There’s even the gall to claim “commentary” in the depiction,
which rarely amounts to more than an “Isn’t it awful? Now let’s get to the
action bit”.
So the Stat is a wanted man, and haunted by what he done (“They put me up a mountain and told me to
kill people. What did they think would come back down the mountain” he
impressively soliloquises). Really, there’s little difference between this and
the average Stat movie; it just has a few pretensions (I was going to say “more
pretensions” but Revolver’s about the
only one that could also apply to). I prefer the literal UK title (Hummingbird; at one point Joey
hallucinates a flock of the birds, a nice little moment that unfortunately
descends into your rote flashback/trippy sequence) than the dead horse-floggingly
literal US one (Redemption; do you
reckon that could be what it’s about? Perhaps you should announce it on the
poster just in case there’s any possibility of doubt)? The French title’s the
best one for ignoring the tone of the picture, though; Crazy Joe indeed!
If Stat’s traumas are sketched in broad strokes, the women
in his life are even more so; hookers and nuns. His mission is to dispense
justice on the man who murdered his homeless friend, and he’s aided and abetted
by a soup kitchen nun (Agata Buzek) with her own traumatic past (unfortunately
the flashback to how Cristina deals with her problem has that reek of movie
implausibility and so pulls the rug from under any impact it might have). Joey
and Cristina have a romance so unlikely, you become convinced Knight is purposefully
baiting his critics to call foul. And while it never for a moment convinces,
not helped by some atrocious dialogue, there’s good chemistry between Stat and
Buzek. We also find Stat playing to his gay fan base; he falls into an empty
flat decorated with rippling man flesh and pretends he’s its occupant’s (Danny
Webb) boyfriend.
While it’s good fun to see the Stat as the underdog
regaining his stride - he does a work out montage, attacks some heavies with a
spoon, and then goes to work for the Chinese mob – Knight allows it all to come
to him much to easily. He has a flat, a car, a credit card, waiting in the post
and a wardrobe filled with perfectly fitting suits (and a very jaunty cap). As usual, Stat in action is
a lot of fun, taking down a gang of footie fans and then attacking with that
spoon the duo who set on him in the opening scene. Knight broaches ideas of
moral equivalency clumsily, using Cristina as a nagging conscience. Joey is
willing not just to go into moral
grey areas to track down his prey; he plunges into darkness. But the picture
never does anything with the idea that his participating in human trafficking
is a justifiable sacrifice in service of his cause.
The resounding box office failure of Hummingbird doesn’t seem to have dented the careers of either the
Stat or Knight. The former remains a safe bet as long as they keep the budget
down or stick him in an ensemble franchise (as Lee Christmas, or in Fast & Furious); he’s been a draw for
more than a decade now, and he’s generally reliable no-brainer entertainment
value. Knight is on a roll, with the success of Peaky Blinders on the small screen and a rash of screenplays coming
up for the big. He’s also had time for his sophomore directing gig, Locke with Tom Hardy. In the case of Hummingbird, aided by old hand
cinematographer Chris Menges, Knight at least doesn’t disgrace himself. Perhaps
given time he can truly impress.
**1/2
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