“Wanted” slams the pedal to the metal and never slows down. Here’s an action picture that’s exhausting in its relentless violence and its ingenuity in inventing new ways to attack, defend, ambush and annihilate. Expanding on a technique I first saw in David O. Russell’s “Three Kings,” it follows individual bullets (as well as flying warriors) through implausible trajectories to pound down the kills.
The movie is based on comic books by Mark Millar and J.G. Jones.
“Wanted,” directed by a hot Russian actionmeister named Timur Bekmambetov, is a film entire lacking in two organs I always appreciate in a movie: a heart and a mind. It is mindless, heartless, preposterous. By the end of the film, we can’t even believe the values the plot seems to believe, since the plot is deceived right along with us. The way to enjoy this film is to put your logic on hold, along with any higher sensitivities that might be vulnerable and immerse yourself as if in a video game.
By Roger Ebert
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