Slick but over-stylised action flick from the Russian director behind the NIGHT WATCH movies. Plot-wise, WANTED borrows heavily from both LEON and THE MATRIX in the story of a young, slightly nerdy man working in a dead end office job who finds himself being indoctrinated into a world of assassins and massive, CGI-heavy action sequences. What follows is extremely fast paced, never for a moment realistic, and full of the kinds of unbelievable OTT scenarios that will give even the most hyperactive child a headache. We've got cars rolling through the air, trains dropping through the sky and, in the film's neatest concept, bullets that can actually bend around obstacles.

WANTED is given some decent credibility thanks to the actors who populate the parts. James McAvoy is fine for the most part, apart from a single car chase in which he screams and whines like a girl for the entire duration. Morgan Freeman sleepwalks through his role and Angelina Jolie is given little to do other than pout and snarl on occasion, but other, minor parts are given to effective performers like Thomas Kretschmann and Terence Stamp. The action comes thick and fast and with it a great deal of heavy violence, and on a superficial level the film admittedly works. But the biggest drawback is Bekmambetov, whose excessive style makes the likes of CRANK and GAMER look like sedate Merchant Ivory productions.

Nice to see that Wanted was given Oscar nominations in two categories related to sound. Well the film was certainly loud enough. But maybe the noise was to cover up the idea that the story was off the wall and unbelievable.

I can see in Wanted where the current cult TV hit Mr. Robot gets some of what is driving it. Our protagonist James McAvoy is a drone of a human being working almost like Jack Lemmon at his desk, taken advantage of by everyone senior to him as Lemmon was in The Apartment. He's even having woman troubles as his girlfriend is being completely faithless.

Well one morning he's the target of a shooting and saved by girl Rambo Angelina Jolie. Turns out that McAvoy is the son of a professional assassin and he's got it in his blood to be one as well. Dad deserted the family as a kid and that's the reason for all of McAvoy's issues.

Well McAvoy under the tutelage of Jolie and head Morgan Freeman our hero develops into a full blown Rambo type and joins the group of secret assassins that have been around for a thousand years. But of course this is hardly the end of the story. And what red blooded American male wouldn't want to get tutelage from Angelina Jolie?

You've got to love Morgan Freeman. That man can make the most pretentious drivel sound like it's from the Old Testament. And he does it in film after film which he's doing for a hefty paycheck between Oscar material like Boys Don't Cry. Well, we all have bills to pay.

Fans of mindless action films will love this.

A thousand years ago, a clan of weavers became assassins for good calling themselves the Fraternity. Wesley Gibson (James McAvoy) is a loser office drone. Then Fox (Angelina Jolie) saves him from an assassin. She tells him that he comes from a long line of assassins and somebody is trying to kill him.

As much as Wesley finds the world so annoying that he needed to be medicated, that's how I felt about the visual style at first. Director Timur Bekmambetov does a too good of a job portraying Wesley's anxiety. The action is uniquely ADD. It's fun until it's not. McAvoy is playing the runt of the litter. He's a great actor, but his character complains too much. Jolie is the cool killer, and Morgan Freeman is the wise sen-sai. As for the loom idea, it's a tough pill to swallow. At least Dexter investigates his targets before killing them.