Bullet Train

If Steven Soderbergh and Guy Ritchie had a baby, it would be Bullet Train
80/10023612
Starring
Brad Pitt, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Brian Tyree Henry, Joey King, Andrew Koji, Hiroyuki Sanada, Michael Shannon, Sandra Bullock
Director
David Leitch
Rating
R
Genre
Action, Comedy
Release Date
August 5, 2022
Where to watch
Netflix
Rating Average
Rating Breakdown
Plot/Story
64%
Performance
80%
Visuals/Cinematography
80%
Direction
85%
WokeWoke-O-MeterBased
BASED
5% WOKE | 95% BASED
Audience Woke Score (Vote)
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Review Summary
Bullet Train is what you'd get if Steven Soderbergh and Guy Ritchie had a baby. It is a ton of fun for those looking for the summer blockbuster hits of yore, and if you want to watch a movie with no agenda other than telling an enjoyable story, you could do a lot worse.

What happens when a bunch of highly trained assassins with overlapping agendas end up riding on the same high-speed train to Kyoto? I’ll tell you what…a lot of bloody fun called Bullet Train, that’s what.

 

From the director of Hobbs & Shaw, Deadpool 2, and John Wick, David Leitch’s Bullet Train is an ensemble action flick with 2022 style and 1980s sensibilities. It’s not interested in deep stories with “important” messages; instead, it gives you a fun premise, characters that you like despite themselves, and action that sets you to cheering. If there is a message being preached, it’s “don’t become a highly trained assassin and if you do, don’t fill in for an @$$hole assassin (i.e., an assassin that is an @$$hole, not one of The Sisters from Shawshank) when he calls in sick.” Words to live by.

You’re gonna swallow what I give you to swallow.

Bullet Train

Without trying to spoil anything, Bullet Train’s story revolves around a silver briefcase, its contents, its destination, and all of those who would like to possess it, as well as those who would like to possess those who may possess it. The head of the Yakuza and rightful owner of the case’s contents ($10 million) has hired a well-known and deadly duo to safely ferry both his son and the case from Tokyo to Kyoto via the Bullet Train. Unbeknownst to the pair, another unnamed organization has gotten wind of the case and has sent Ladybug, played by Brad Pitt (Once Upon A Time…in Hollywood, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Fight Club), to steal it. Begin one of the most violent comedy of errors that you’ve ever seen.

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Ladybug is a veteran “snatch and grab man” (read: spy/thief) who’s been semi-retired for a short time while he searched for a new, more peaceful path in life. It was his hope that this would turn his chronic bad luck around, thereby reducing his anxiety. However, luck, or fate, has other ideas for him.

Few actors today can play breezy and likable like Pitt, and even fewer scripts would write a cis white male character who embodies those traits, let alone a character who is also competent and capable of handing out an @$$whooping. Ladybug is almost casually bad@$$, feeling bad for his enemies because he’s unable to stop himself from deflecting their death blows, and he hates that he was the cause of their failure.

That’s not to say that Ladybug is an unstoppable Marty Sue. In fact, he’s deeply flawed and regularly feels the need to call his handler, Maria, played by Sandra Bullock, so that she can help him clear his head and stay focused on the task at hand. He also takes his share of lumps throughout the film, mostly at the hands of The Twins.

Respectively played by Aaron Taylor-Johnson (Avenger: Age of Ultron, The Kingsman, Kick-Ass 1&2) and Brian Tyree Henry (Godzilla vs. Kong, Spider-Man: Into The Spiderverse), the assassins/bodyguards, Tangerine and Lemon, whose job it is to protect and deliver the Yakuza leader’s son and cash, steal the show.

They are two brothers (thought to be twins by those who are not in the know) with very different temperaments but who love one another deeply. We don’t find out that the two are brothers for some time, and due to the fact that they are of different races, it’s not a supposition to which many would immediately leap. In fact, things being what they are nowadays, I found myself assuming that the bickering couple would end up being lovers. However, in one of many refreshing artistic choices, the film opts to show that two men can love one another without being romantically involved.

tangerine and lemon bullet train
Tangerine and Lemon

Aaron’s Tangerine is so much damn fun that it’s criminal that Johnson isn’t staring in more movies. There’s an old musical/film titled A Chorus Line that is about a Broadway dancer who is just past her prime and is now auditioning for a role in a Broadway musical’s chorus line. However, the instincts that once took her to stardom are now a hindrance because she intuitively adds tiny flourishes that would work for a lead but are a distraction for those meant to blend into the background.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not implying Aaron is past his prime. I am saying that he’s a show pony who can’t help but draw focus to himself. He’s completely invested in the character and, with a dozen little flourishes, manages to elevate what should be a 1-dimensional character to 2.5.

“Why not 3D,” you ask. Let us not forget that Bullet Train is a movie in which kung-fu sword masters and middle-aged American assassins fight teenage caucasian kawaii on a speeding train while dodging venomous snakes and knife-wielding cholos, so let’s just be happy that he’s able to elevate the material as much as he does. That being said, there are moments when Tangerine is thinking about his brother that, in another movie, would bring you to tears. Forget restoring the Snyderverse. Let’s start a Put-Aaron-Taylor-Johnson-In-more-movies movement (#PATJIMM).

Tangerine’s brother and counterpart, played by Brian Tyree Henry, could have easily been an obnoxious twit with a silly obsession with Thomas the Train. Throughout the movie, he regularly relates situations and people to the children’s show, so much so that I was getting PTSD flashbacks to 1993’s Airborne. It’s a ridiculous movie, the only true purpose of which was to sell rollerblades. In it, the protagonist is an insipid California surfer-dude who uses surf analogies like Nick Cannon uses women’s wombs, often and then leaves others to deal with it. However, in Bullet Train, Henry plays Lemon with such innocence and easy charm that you can’t help but root for him…despite the fact that he’s a cold-blooded killer.

WOKE ELEMENTS

In a movie that blue-haired woketards bashed for whitewashing, you might be inclined to surmise that including Zazie Beetz, who plays The Hornet, was a political decision. After all, she didn’t fit in with the rest of the group. Her performance was wooden, and her fighting wasn’t up to the same level as the rest of the cast. However, she played the standout character Domino in David Leitch’s 2018 Deadpool 2, so much so that there was talk of her getting her own spinoff, and I know that I was rooting for it.

So, I think that this was more a case of the director having warm-and-fuzzies for her and her just not being right for the material. Also, despite the character’s bravado, she gets her @$$ handed to her pretty handily in this film when pitted against a male character. In today’s Black-Widow-can-hold-her-own-against-super-powered-super-villans world, I know that I expected her to be a snarky b!t@h who could hand out beatings like she was Ike and guys several inches taller, 50 lbs heavier, and with a lifetime of testosterone having built their bones and muscle were Tina. Since that didn’t happen, I say there be no woke here.

It’s become the norm to substitute offputting sarcastic jerk women who are caricatures of what a room full of privileged women-studies graduates think that a man is in lieu of believable female characters grounded in reality. Therefore, the final possible argument for wokeness in this film might be Joey King’s Prince (for clarification’s sake, Joey is a girl). Prince is a precocious tw@t who outthinks all of her male counterparts…except that she doesn’t, and, unlike Kit from the travesty that is the new Willow series, she’s not supposed to be likable. She is a villain who behaves villainously. She’s also performed to perfection by King. I rule…not guilty of wokeness.

One could also make the case that deciding to make two brothers of two different races is a clear sign of diversity hiring. Again, I say nay. Henry was absolutely the best man for the job, and the choice was made for comedic purposes. Also, it’s not like they couldn’t be half-brothers or had been adopted. No woke for you.

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James Carrick

James Carrick is a passionate film enthusiast with a degree in theater and philosophy. James approaches dramatic criticism from a philosophic foundation grounded in aesthetics and ethics, offering insight and analysis that reveals layers of cinematic narrative with a touch of irreverence and a dash of snark.

2 comments

  • phukwokies

    May 5, 2024 at 9:05 pm

    Left out the two major woke parts.
    1 – The line about “white girl tears”. Totally unnecessary.
    2 – The line about “mansplaining”. Again, out of the blue.

    Reply

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