The Foreigner
(2017)
(SPOILERS) If nothing else, The Foreigner proves Martin Campbell is still more than capable of
handling the action rigours of another Bond
movie (please, Eon get someone in who can focus on what’s essential, like
killing bad guys with wanton relish). Unfortunately, his tail-between-his-legs six-year
break from the big screen following the disastrously-received Green Lantern has been curtailed for a feature
that only ever feels like two different ones spliced together, both of them beached
from a different time. One is a mid-90s actioner in which a B-movie star attempts
to flex their thespian muscles and doesn’t quite pull it off. The other, a
nominally serious-minded post-Troubles picture that might have seemed more
relevant a decade – or more – ago with its essentially pulp fiction version of
Gerry Adams.
As lurid as the Liam Hennessy character is, a former IRA man
now Northern Ireland’s First Minister who has obviously not turned over the new non-violent leaf he flourishes in public,
Pierce Brosnan’s performance anchors The
Foreigner and does enough to make several sections both engrossing and
entertaining. There’s no getting away from his plotline being deeply daft – he
ordered the bombings that killed the daughter of Ngoc Minh Quan (Jackie Chan),
but it was a piece of political graft and there should have been warnings given
beforehand; that there weren’t turns out to be a piece of machination at the
behest of his wife (Orla Brady), no less, disgruntled at his appeasement and
service to the Brits… Did I mention that she is shagging Liam’s nephew? – but
Brosnan, one of the most consistently underrated leading men left standing,
lends conviction and an Oirish accent to his beleaguered politician. When the
pressure starts to mount, it isn’t Chan going all John Rambo in the woods that
impresses, it’s Pierce beating the shoit out of Dermot Crowley and shooting him
in the legs (capping it all by popping a cap in his head).
Jackie may want to be taken seriously as an actor, but a
sombre, buttoned-down disposition isn’t his forte. The Foreigner is based on The
Chinaman (those on Quan’s trail assume he is Chinese, designating him with
the title’s racist epithet), a 1992 novel by Stephen Leather, and it’s unable
to shrug off those yesteryear trappings. Chan moves through the proceedings out
of step with the prevailing political pandemonium, even when Quan’s directly
influencing it, and Campbell has to adjust to accommodate (Chan’s moves are single-shot
affairs, even at his age, so the director is forced to hold back on his more
muscular, potent editing style during such sequences). Campbell’s construction
of the set pieces (in particular, Quan posing as the gas man before making
short work of the bombers in their safe house) is as efficient as ever, but
Chan is unable to make Quan an interesting or compelling character (despite his
Special Forces training and dogged determination), and thus we spend our time
waiting for the story to cut back to Brosnan.
The good news is that The
Foreigner was a modest hit, largely down to its Chinese box office (nearly
60% of the global gross), which should spell progress on whatever Campbell
wants to make next (he has Across the
River and Into the Trees with Brosnan and Ana with Gong Li on his slate). Brosnan, of course, has made a
habit of giving juicy supporting performances in unremarkable genre fare of
late (Survivor, No Escape) when really, he deserves the kind of unlikely aging
action star career of Liam Neeson. Perhaps he should team with Liam for
something. The last time they did (Seraphim
Falls), the results were terrific.
Agree? Disagree? Mildly or vehemently? Let me know in the comments below.