Proving that nerds are perfectly capable of being cold-blooded super-spy assassins, The Amateur, which hits theaters April 11, sends Rami Malek’s cryptographer on a mission of mousetrap-orchestrated murder.
The second big-screen adaptation of Robert Littell’s novel (following Charles Jarrott’s 1981 film of the same name), director James Hawes’ thriller concerns a desk jockey who carries out a revenge plot with extreme prejudice and few qualms about the illegality of his undertaking—thereby rendering his tale an unmitigated celebration of vigilantism that’s undimmed by the fact that he doesn’t technically get his hands dirty. Unsurprising from start to finish and yet proficiently executed thanks to its impressive cast, it’s the definition of serviceable.
Charles Heller (Malek) is a CIA geek whose love for his computer is second only to his affection for his wife Sarah (Rachel Brosnahan). Departing to London for work, Sarah chides her husband for not joining her by saying that he needs to “take a risk,” but the way he runs alongside her car like a puppy dog as she leaves suggests that he’s perfectly comfortable at home, where he spends his free time tinkering with a Cessna plane that Sarah procured for him.
Still, Charles isn’t a purely by-the-books guy, as evidenced by his ongoing rapport with a mysterious online contact known as Inquiline (Caitriona Balfe) who sends him encrypted files that, he quickly deduces, contain top-secret documents which implicate his boss Deputy Director Alex Moore (Holt McCallany) in the cover-up of numerous rogue CIA operations.
Charles is ostensibly too wimpy and dorky to do anything about this bombshell discovery, but he’s prodded into action when, the following morning, he’s informed that Sarah was kidnapped and slain in the streets of London by a quartet of armed baddies. This rocks Charles, who channels his grief into rage and promptly blackmails his boss, threatening to release his damning documents to the press unless the agency turns him into a special-ops bada-- (like his wannabe best friend “The Bear,” played fleetingly by Jon Bernthal) so he can hunt down and eliminate his wife’s killers.
Alex laughs at the idea that Charles is willing or able to go through with this perilous undertaking, and he has good reason, since Malek is about as physically imposing as a chihuahua. Nonetheless, fearful of a scandal, Alex begrudgingly complies, assigning Charles to study under Robert Henderson (Laurence Fishburne) as he and his cohorts frantically search for Charles’ incriminating data.
Robert is initially unimpressed with Charles, who demonstrates that he can only shoot a target at point-blank range. While he’s far more adept at building IEDs, that isn’t enough to convince Robert that his would-be protégé is ready for field duty. No matter—before he’s sent back to the office, Charles hits the road to hunt the foursome he holds responsible for Sarah’s demise.
None of this is particularly believable and The Amateur so hastily speeds through Charles and Robert’s training that, aside from affording the former with access to passports (and establishing the duo’s relationship), it comes across as a relative waste of time and energy. Moreover, like the rest of the proceedings, it’s shot by director Hawes in a monotonous blue-black-gray sheen that stifles any vibrancy.
Even so, The Amateur isn’t without propulsion, and its cast is stacked with charismatic performers who lend it a sturdy professionalism. As Charles sneaks around Europe, Alex strives to keep his nefariousness under wraps from CIA Director O’Brien (Julianne Nicholson), who’s interested in having the agency uphold its core values, and McCallany exudes enough sinister cockiness to keep this thin thread from totally fraying.
Balfe, meanwhile, does as much as is humanely possible with the underwritten Inquiline, who’s primarily a plot device designed to offer Charles a bit of sympathetic human contact and comfort, as well as the vital logistical support he needs. At routine intervals, the film (written by Ken Nolan and Gary Spinelli) hinges on conveniences, but mercifully, any eye-roll-worthy moments are handled swiftly and without the fanfare that might call undue attention to their clunkiness.
Largely stuck playing Sarah’s ghost, whom Charles sees wherever he goes, including a dance club and his various hotel rooms, Brosnahan gets the short end of The Amateur’s stick. The film hopscotches around the globe to assorted cafés for oh-so-important meetings, and it has its main character devise impressively clever ways to off those on his hit list—the best of which involves a hotel’s elevated “sky pool.”
Despite Alex mocking him early on as wanting to be James Bond, Charles is more akin to a geeky version of Liam Neeson’s Taken do-gooder, ridding the world of cretins via the use of his very particular set of skills—which, in this case, boils down to a facility with cutting-edge technology.
Malek’s off-kilter intensity is a nice fit for Charles, even though The Amateur remains, throughout, firmly in the realm of fantasy. Hunted by Robert (on Alex’s orders) and other CIA ciphers, Charles becomes the Little Executioner That Could, ending lives in elaborately creative fashion and evading his pursuers through facial-recognition software trickery and lots of, well, running.
Director Hawes’ action sequences leave more than a bit to be desired, particularly a skirmish between Robert and a fellow spook that’s murky and anticlimactic. What it lacks in flair or originality, however, it makes up for in workmanlike competence, at least until a ho-hum climax in which Charles faces off against the man, Schiller (Michael Stuhlbarg), who ended Sarah’s life.
At just over two hours, The Amateur is never sleepy but it is a bit saggy, especially given that there’s little doubt Charles will accomplish most, if not all, of his goals. A late scene reveals that even gifted killers must make occasional grocery runs to Kroger’s, adding a subtle bit of levity to these otherwise dour proceedings.
If generally short on humor, though, this do-over is reasonably engaging and rarely wearying, and better yet, it’s an honest-to-goodness adult thriller that appears uninterested in launching a franchise—two elements that alone make it a refreshing respite from today’s IP-ified cinematic slate.
