Movie Review: Parker

Parker is yet another bad Jason Statham movie in the long, sad career of Jason Statham and it pretty much confirms his position as the all new (and bald) Jean Claude Van Damme. 2007’s The Bank Job is a distant memory now and it seems unlikely that he’d ever sign up for a genuinely great movie.

If you’re looking for a movie that even remotely deviates from any other Jason Statham movie formula, you’d be better off steering clear of Parker, because it’s got Mr Statham walking, talking, wisecracking, punching, kicking, grinning the way he does in every single movie of his to date. He even wears the suit from the Transporter series – it’s like he isn’t even trying anymore. Directed by Taylor Hackford, who made An officer and a gentleman and Ray, the film mashes together plots from Statham’s half a dozen earlier films and adds a has been star (Jennifer Lopez) into the mix to form a mostly putrid puree that writer John McLoughlin clumsily markets for five year olds.

The story details remain as minimalistic as possible – Statham owes $200,000 to some baddies or a lot of people would die. But Statham is the Emraan Hashmi of the United States, so is too moralistic to steal from the poor – instead, he decides to pull off a heist that eventually goes wrong as a team member double crosses him and leaves him for the dead. Statham, now pissed, gets into Crank mode and proceeds to exact revenge, hook up with the world’s hottest depressed real estate agent (Lopez) and rescue his kidnapped girlfriend. The action scenes are as usual Statham guaranteed eye candy as the man stretches his muscles and imagination to new levels of incredulity – his superpower still remains keeping the muscles on his face immobile through all the buffoonery going down on screen. To make sure you leave the theater laughing your head off, he even speaks briefly in what is by far the worst fake Texan accent to have ever been captured on camera. That last time Statham evoked laughter of these decibel levels was when he wore a toupee in Guy Ritchie’s Revolver. 

(First published in MiD Day)