Revolver

An often astonishingly incoherent trainwreck, Revolver follows Jason Statham’s Jake Green embarks on a campaign of revenge against the man (Ray Liotta’s Dorothy Macha) responsible for his seven-year prison stint. It’s as straight forward a premise as one could possibly envision and yet writer/director Guy Ritchie delivers a momentum-free and generally baffling narrative devoid of positive attributes, as the movie, which rarely makes any sense, has been infused with a progressively avant-garde feel that slowly-but-surely negates its few affable elements (including Statham’s typically commanding performance and a very sporadic smattering of stylish interludes). The movie’s perpetually hands-off-atmosphere is compounded by an often unreasonably deliberate pace and continuing emphasis on nonsensical episodes, with the ensuing herky-jerky vibe ensuring that the viewer is left fruitlessly searching for something (anything) to connect to for the duration of the seemingly endless 111 minute running time. There’s virtually nothing within Revolver that wholeheartedly works, as Ritchie, in his misguided attempt at creating something unconventional, floods the proceedings with a series of ill-advised components that cumulatively transform the picture into a seriously aggravating experience. The comically bewildering final stretch ensures that Revolver ends on as underwhelming and anticlimactic a note as one could possibly envision, and it’s ultimately impossible to recall a more disastrous endeavor from a hit-and-miss yet undeniably talented filmmaker.

* out of ****