The Courier – Review

The Courier has so many flaws it’s hard to know where to begin. Firstly, the story itself is woeful. A painful mishmash of assassins, FBI agents, Elvis-impersonating arch villains, and the obligatory female tag-along love interest. Ugh. I was especially amused by the hero’s uncanny ability to instantly hack any computer to instantly locate just the info he was looking for. I mean why bother being a high- risk delivery man, which is clearly not paying off too well for him, when he could make a ton of money working for Google? The movie started out great, getting to know the courier and his type of work, just finishing a job. He is then forced into his next job, which is a bit out of his comfort zone – making an unknown delivery to an unfindable crime lord. As a whole, the delivered briefcase, the job, and the impossible plot made no sense. All the obligatory elements in the movie viewed apart – the sidekicks, the stolen airplane, the torture, the assassins, the bugged apartments, the murders, the arrests, anagrams, and much more had a feel of pointlessness and irrelevance to it, as if someone just grabbed some spy story ingredients and threw them together.

This movie certainly had style. It seemed to be directed well. Editing was crisp enough and on the surface it looked pretty interesting. Cinematography was basically very good and quite inventive with a lot of action. But the whole package was a mile wide and an inch deep because the screenplay was a muddled mess, the storyline was laughably inane. Mickey Rourke and Lili Taylor, two actors who can really deliver the goods, were incredibly wasted and about a third of the way into it you realized it was going to be all style and no substance, and that was when I just stopped caring. A clue as to what happened comes when the credits roll. Producers, co-producers, associate producers, executive producers galore.

That bad guy, whose nickname makes you want to roll on the floor laughing… Is only showed from behind, in the shadows. He is said to have died and come back from the grave. The way they describe it in the movie. At first you’re not sure if its going to turn into some black comedy! I like Morgan but Statham is really the only one who should do this role. If you liked the “Transporter” then you will probably like this one. The ending did make it a little better and the second half was entertaining but this is pretty much “Transporter 4″. I can see what kind of approach they were going for but they obviously failed with it. They tried to create a smaller and more realistic type of action movie but the story and its characters really aren’t suited for that. I actually believe I might had liked this movie better, had it been done as a silly and over-the-top action-flick, in a more ’80′s type of style. The movie has a very simple concept but it makes things needlessly difficult. Because of this you will start to loose interest in it all pretty fast and after a while you simply have no idea what is going on anymore.

Those who are looking for a movie with plenty of action to enjoy will also end up feeling disappointed by this movie. This movie feels like such an extremely low-budget one and things don’t get any more exciting than a couple of poorly filmed gunfights. Certainly nothing spectacular, surprising or exciting about this movie. After 30 minutes, the movie starts to fall apart. A character or two whom you’ve never seen before or even heard referenced start showing up, and are ascribed importance for no fathomable reason. The action sequences, though not terrible, no longer hold any weight due to the confusion caused by the messy script, and plot holes and character inconsistencies abound. How many different ways can I just say this film is bad? Avoid.