A Movie Called American Assassin Really Shouldn't Be This Deathly Dull

Mitch Rapp (Dylan O'Brien) has a chip on his shoulder. That chip didn't come from any Pringles can though, no, it came from watching his girlfriend (and for a moment, fiancee) get brutally slaughtered at the beach by a bunch of gun-toting terrorists. While Mitch, who serves as the lead character of director Michael Cuesta's new movie American Assassin, survived that attack and every day since then, he's been training like a madman in order to make sure he's in peak physical condition to take down as many terrorists across the globe as possible. While trying to kill a group of terrorists, he gets his plans interrupted by a group of U.S. government agents who take him in for some questioning by Deputy Director Irene Kennedy (Sanaa Lathan).


Kennedy is mighty impressed by Mitch Rapp's skills and determination and decides to offer him a chance to kill terrorists not as a rogue vigilante but as a government-hired assassin. Rapp decides to take up the offer which will require him to undergo extensive training by Stan Hurley (Michael Keaton). It soon becomes clear to Hurley that Mitch Rapp is not the kind of guy to follow orders of any kind, which is gonna make him difficult to work with in the field, but they're gonna have to cooperate if they're gonna take down a man named Ghost (Taylor Kitsch), whom Hurley has a shared history with, who threatens the entire world.

Similar to Dylan O'Brien's lead character from those Maze Runner movie, Mitch Rapp is a generic action hero with no real discernable personality to his name. Rapp is consumed by a lust for vengeance and he's not gonna follow rules, that's all we get to know about him. In between ceaseless demonstrations of these two facets of his being, O'Brien's performance is unable to really convey all that much in the way of a unique demeanor or an intimidating presence. Him constantly being told to suppress his emotions by his superiors only makes it even more difficult to get attached to this guy as a person, he's absolutely no John Wick or any of the great movie superheroes in terms of action movie lead characters. The movies mission to get the viewer to be endeared to this guy isn't helped by Mitch Rapp clearly locking a couple of dogs in a car with the windows rolled up. Animal abuse is just what I look for in my action movie heroes.

I'm sure many will defend the lack of development for Mitch Rapp as a person by saying American Assassin is inherently more about action than characterization, which would be fine if the movie itself had any good action to speak of. Recent years have been kind to the R-rated American action movie but American Assassin is not an extension of that kindness as it lumbers around from one tedious action scene to the next. Generic gunfire, a geographically confusing tunnel car chase and a climactic fistfight on a boat are the meek highlights of this feature's anemic idea of what constitutes thrilling action. Much can be forgiven in an action movie, but instilling a sense of boredom during the fight scenes is most certainly not one of them.

The screenplay, credited to four different writers, including Edward Zwick (who was gonna direct this thing once upon a time), fares even worse on the more intimate character-building scenes that transpire in between the tepid action scenes. There isn't anything remotely resembling an emotionally engaging relationship on-screen here as people exchange stilted dialogue that zaps any trace of humanity from the various interactions between the characters. A number of good actors are forced to deal with this kind of abysmal dialogue as well as some horribly realized characters. Sanaa Lathan gets wasted in a turn as Mitch's superior, who has nothing to do but constantly serve as a voice of praise for our protagonist while Scott Adkins is hilariously wasted in a supporting role that never once offers him the chance to use his hand-to-hand combat skills. As the baddie, Taylor Kitsch is stuck with a Southern accent and not much else. Someone get Kitsch in an actually good movie, I beg of you.

I did actually like the nice touch of how Michael Keaton's mentor character seems to be just your normal fly-over-state Grandpa when he's not training assassins as he gets up early in the morning with his doggie and sips his coffee on the porch, but aside from that and an interrogation scene that serves as the only source of fun in American Assassin since Keaton gets to go full-tilt over-the-top ("Ya wanna get nuts? C'MON! Let's get nuts!"), poor Keaton doesn't get much to do with his character. Even the relationship he shares with Mitch Rapp gets botched, as he's already warming up to the kid after they've spent only two minutes together, meaning there's nowhere else for these to go on a character level for the rest of the movie. But really, would anyone expect a key character dynamic like that to be handled properly in a movie as tedious and slapdash as American Assassin?