Movie Review: Way Too Many Words to Say I Don't Recommend 'The Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard'

I was baffled when I heard that there was going to be a sequel to The Hitman’s Bodyguard. I had believed that the movie wasn’t much of a hit. Thus, I was surprised to learn that the movie had made more $175 million dollars worldwide on what looked like a budget of $30.00. I know it was $30 million but did you see The Hitman’s Bodyguard? The effects looked like the result of a really sketchy green screen and liberal use of MS Paint.

So, here we are, The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard, a title so unwieldy that I doubt anyone will actually say it. Ticket buyers will either request tickets to see Hitman’s Bodyguard or 'the one with Ryan Reynolds and Sam Jackson.' The title doesn’t even make sense in the context of the movie, Reynolds doesn’t act as Salma Hayek’s bodyguard, he’s more like an obligation she and Jackson have that they tolerate until the plot requires them to accept him as they sort of did in the first movie.

I don’t know why I am dunking on the title, I think it is because I am so bored with this movie that I am struggling to find interesting things to say about it. The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard is yet another terrible movie in which the lead actors are really good but the idiot plot they are trapped within renders their hard work pointless. I can say that Director Patrick Hughes has improved as a director in the four years since The Hitman’s Bodyguard but not by much. He has better effects but his taste in gory violence opposed by terrible comedy made better by funny actors leaves a lot to be desired.

As the plot of The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard kicks in, Reynolds' Michael Bryce is struggling with having lost his license to be a bodyguard. We are asked by this plot to believe that a bodyguard not having a license is the end of the world, a desperate, despairing loss. Michael is haunted by a nightmare wherein he wins a Bodyguard Award only to have Jackson’s hitman, Darius, show up in the crowd at the Oscars style Bodyguard Awards and laugh maniacally until Michael is forced to relive his professional nadir, when Darius murdered one of Bryce’s clients.

Later in the movie, it is hinted that this Bodyguard Award Show is a real thing in this movie universe and I groaned. Involuntarily, I groaned at how hard the writer’s were working to make us care about Michael’s Bodyguard license and love of being a bodyguard. Whatever, again, it's not an important point, but The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard is so exasperating at times that I can’t focus on anything that might be remotely important.

Michael is advised by his therapist that he should take a vacation and he does. However, while on vacation in Italy, Michael is kidnapped by Sonia (Salma Hayek), Darius’s wife. Darius has been kidnapped while the two were on their honeymoon and she wants Michael to help get him back safely. She claims that Darius asked for Michael’s help though Darius actually said he wanted the opposite of Michael, literally anyone else. Much of the humor of The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard is derived from humiliating Michael but he’s Ryan Reynolds so it’s kind of hard to buy into.

Remember those Bugs Bunny cartoons where another character got over on Bugs and made Bugs the butt of the joke? Those were always the worst Bugs Bunny cartoons. No one watched Bugs Bunny to watch Bugs lose in the end. We watch Bugs Bunny to see Bugs get the best of everyone around him. Bugs is always the coolest character in any scenario and that’s why we loved Bugs Bunny. Reynolds has cultivated a Bugs Bunny, above it all, persona over his career and it just isn’t particularly believable or entertaining watching people dunk on him. Reynolds doesn’t play the nerd well, he doesn’t play the butt of the joke well.

It might work once in a while because Reynolds can play an underdog but just about every joke, every scene of The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard, is dedicated to finding new ways to embarrass or humiliate Reynolds. I genuinely wondered during the movie whether Director Patrick Hughes had it for his star. Perhaps he genuinely can’t stand that Reynolds is movie star handsome and incredibly funny to boot. Thus Hughes casts him in a role where he is the constant butt of not mere embarrassment, but repeated humiliation throughout The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard.

Furthermore, when Reynolds isn’t being verbally humiliated by the other characters in the movie, including the big name guest star hired to play his father, Reynolds is being physically harmed. Reynolds’ Michael is hit by cars, shot in the chest, while wearing Kevlar, hit with shovels, thrown through a windshield, and repeatedly punched, including by the character who is playing his father. Physical and emotional humiliation is constantly heaped upon Reynolds to the point that I could actually recommend this movie if you don’t like Reynolds and would enjoy seeing the star repeatedly harmed and humiliated.

Jackson, for his part, is relatively checked out. He’s not nearly as bored as Gary Oldman was as the villain of the previous movie in this franchise, but not far off. He comes to life a little when he gets to make out with Salma Hayek, but gone is the badass energy he brought to the first movie. Jackson genuinely came off as a wildcard, a psycho with a genuine edge. Here, it could be Jackson just being in his 70s and slowing down with age, but I can’t rule out that he’s just happily picking up a paycheck.

The only people who appear excited and happy to be part of this very silly movie are Salma Hayek and Antonio Banderas who portrays the movie’s antagonist. Hayek repeatedly popped me during The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard. She has moments that even as grumpy as I was about the rest of the movie, I could not resist laughing out loud. I can’t think of any specific examples now that I am a few hours from having seen the movie, but I do remember several big, loud laughs and all of them coming from Hayek’s audacious performance.

Banderas meanwhile, relishes his villain role. He’s not a spectacularly memorable villain but when he and Hayek are on screen together, you can sense their chemistry. It’s been nearly 20 years since the two co-starred in Once Upon a Time in Mexico the follow up to the equally steamy and exciting Desperado, but their smoldering glares remain. They have only a couple scenes in The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard but those moments are superior to most of the rest of the movie because I was so entertained by how Hayek and Banderas so easily slip back into their attraction to each other. They also get the best running gag in the movie involving a reference to the movie Overboard.

I’ve written a great deal more than I expected to about The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard. I’m still baffled by its very existence but I can say it does improve, slightly, on the original. If only because Patrick Hughes had actual professionals helping him stage the action here, as opposed to the amateurish effects of the original film. And, Salma Hayek is really funny several times in the movie. Neither Hughes’ slight improvement as a director or Hayek’s funny performance are enough to get me to recommend The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard, but at least there is a stronger effort here than in the original movie. Those who must try this movie for whatever reason, may not feel entirely ripped off by it.