What’s this all about?
In Bangkok Dangerous, we get to see a high-priced, international assassin take on his “last big job” following the three rules that have kept him alive for his entire career.
Of course, he breaks all three rules, with predictable results.
It’s your standard late 2000’s action piece in which a single American actor leads a cast entirely made up of Asians, but in this one, the white guy teaches martial arts to one of the Asians. It’s a mess.
Who is Nick in this one?
Nick plays “Joe,” an angsty professional hitman who only kills bad guys, or something. He has three rules in his line of work; “don’t get attached to the locals,” “leave without a trace as soon as you can,” and “don’t ask questions.” He’s preachy and, well, angsty.
Who else is in this one?
Every other person in this film is an Asian actor. This probably says more about me than it does about the cast, but I didn’t recognize a single person.
Did you see that?
In one of the assasination scenes, we see Nick, making a long range sniper shot from a hidden spot. Of course, most of it is just Nick hunched over a rifle, grunting.
What stood out to me, though, was that the scope on his rifle was clearly and boldly labeled “Bushnell 3-9 x 40.” That indicates that this scope has magnification that can be adjusted from 3x magnification to 9x magnification, that it has a 40mm objective lens, and that it was manufactured by Bushnell.
This would be a fine scope for deer hunting. This would almost certainly not be the optic of choice of a professional long-range sniper who has multiple custom motorcycles. It’s the kind of scope that you’d find in the mid-range price section of a sporting goods store.
They couldn’t have slapped a piece of electrical tape over that label? -Michael
In this movie, Nick cuts a man’s hand and forearm off. The hand kept moving after being severed for way too long. It not only was unrealistic, it also was pointless. -Sarah
What were Nick’s best parts?
There weren’t really any standout scenes in this bland mess. Nick mostly looks somewhere in between confused and constipated while delivering his lines. I guess his “best” scene is the one in which he visits the home of his deaf/mute Thai pharmacist girlfriend and her Mom (yeah, I don’t know either). As soon as his girlfriend sees him, she clearly wants nothing to do with him (he’s recently murdered a couple of guys in the street when she wasn’t looking, and gotten blood all over her sweater). Nick briefly looks exasperated, then wordlessly leaves. It seemed like a genuine reaction to a shitty experience. -Michael
I most liked the scene where Nick met his deaf girlfriend. For most of the movie Nick was emotionless, but for a brief moment he seemed human during this exchange. -Sarah
What were Nick’s worst parts?
Nick teaches his Thai sidekick “Kong” how to fight. In a montage, we see Nick giving him lessons in shooting and hand-to-hand combat. For some reason, the latter takes the form of Nick and Kong wriggling their forearms together, while Nick looks uninterestedly into the distance. Maybe he’s looking at a cool bird, or a squirrel in the neighbor’s back yard.
He looks completely checked out, and whatever they are doing makes no sense.
I feel like Nick, or the filmmakers, saw someone doing some training exercise, completely misunderstood it, and included it in the film. -Michael
As I mentioned, Nick spent most of this movie showing little emotion. He basically had a very deadpan face, but there was a few scenes where he kind of squinted his features in a bit. To be honest, I have no idea what he was trying to convey. It was normally during wordless montages, so I couldn’t really use context either. Any of these scenes count as his worst scene. -Sarah
How was the movie?
This movie isn’t fun, or cool, or exciting, or interesting.
It really just plods along, doing exactly what you think it’s going to do. If you can’t predict the ending of this movie in the first ten minutes, you might want to have yourself tested for a pulse.
The action is fine, but it serves almost no point.
The characters are impossibly thin.
There’s just nothing here to make me care about anything that happens.
Bangkok Dangerous cost $45 million to make. $38 million of that was Nick’s paycheck. The movie made $42 million at the box office. I don’t understand Hollywood. If my boss gave me $38 million to lose him $3 million, I’d retire immediately. I certainly wouldn’t feel the need to make a Ghost Rider sequel. -Michael
This movie was bad, bad, bad. I had trouble following the plot and just keeping focus. It was so boring my mind kept wondering. -Sarah
Yeah, but did you like it?
Bangkok Dangerous isn’t astoundingly bad. It just isn’t entertaining. It’s like a gas station bean and cheese burrito. It’s a burrito, there’s just nothing enjoyable about it. -Michael
I did not enjoy this movie. It was boring for an action flick. There were a few scenes that had some nice effects. -Sarah
Where can I watch it?
It’s on Amazon Prime.
Leave a Reply