KYMM'S 365 DAY MOVIE CHALLENGE #29: The Protégé (2021, dir by Martin Campbell, USA)
“I’d like to see you again, under different circumstances.”
“This was personal time. These are the best circumstances you’re going to get.”
This was a trailer that my friend Blake and I saw that made us really excited to see the movie, but unlike like Free Guy, which kept coming out with more and more trailers than ended up spoiling all the best bits of the movie, this stuck with just one trailer, and it was intriguing but not spoilery. And it ended up shooting to #1 on both of our lists of best new films we saw in the theatres together in 2021. A very specific list that is different than my favourite films of the year, it’s more a best of the blockbusters list.
The film starts in Vietnam 30 years ago, with Samuel L. Jackson finding a bunch of dead bodies and a small girl with a big gun. It turns out that he is Moody, an assassin with a good heart, and he takes that child with him, and she grows up to be Anna (Maggie Q), also an assassin. What else is she going to be? If you come from a family of plumbers, it is no shock if you too become a plumber. You are raised by an assassin, you will not become a plumber.
They only kill bad people, so therefore it’s OK for you and me in the audience to like them as much as we do. And we do, because they are Samuel L. Jackson and Maggie Q, both intensely likable performers no matter how many people they shoot down dead. And stab. And maim. And break their necks with their thighs. Like you do.
Moody starts looking into someone from the past, and everything goes all cattywampus. People get killed, and Anna has to go and be awesome in 1000 different ways, also outfits and hairstyles. Then Michael Keaton shows up, and my goodness me (fans self). Mr. Michael Keaton at the age of 70 needs to do many more films where he speaks quietly and beats people up handily, because it is frankly sooper sexxy. And even better when he is paired with Maggie Q, whom he does not beat up handily, I hasten to add, as she is more than a match for him.
The performances are just terrific across the board. Maggie Q is a performer whom I have heard of, but have never seen before, and I 100% need to watch a bunch more of her movies tout suite.
It was extremely interesting seeing Samuel L. Jackson playing another assassin after seeing The Hitman‘s Wife’s Bodyguard a couple of months ago. The latter is pure farce and silliness, this movie is more emotionally grounded, and he was great in both of them. In a smaller role, it was lovely to see dear old Robert Patrick again. He works consistently, I am happy to see on IMDb, but I haven’t seen him in a while.
In looking for a quote to put at the top of this post, I was entirely shocked to see how mediocre the other reviews are. I suppose everyone has their own taste and their own opinions, and none of them are wrong because how can your personal opinion about an experience be wrong, but these people are wrong wrong wrong, this movie was great. Top of the list.
Kymm Zuckert is an actor/writer/native Angelino. When Kymm was a child, her parents would take her to see anything, which means that sometimes she will see a film today and say, “I saw that when I was eight, I don’t remember any of that inappropriate sex stuff!” Check out her entire 365 day blog @ https://365filmsin365days.movie.blog