By: Andrew Wing
Beckett is a 2021 action thriller film directed by Ferdinando Cito Filomarino in his English-language feature film debut. The film stars John David Washington as the title character, Beckett, an American tourist vacationing in Greece who becomes the target of a manhunt after a tragic accident, and he must reach the embassy to clear his name. Alicia Vikander (Ex Machina, The Green Knight - see review here), Vicky Krieps (Hanna, Old - see review here), and Boyd Holbrook (Logan, The Predator) also star in supporting roles.
Beckett had its world premiere at the 74th Locarno Film Festival in Switzerland on August 4, 2021, and was digitally released on August 13th, by Netflix.
THE GOOD
Once I saw the trailer for Beckett on Netflix a month or two ago, I immediately knew I was going to check it out because of who was starring in it, and that would be John David Washington. For those of you who don’t know, John David Washington’s father is Denzel Washington, just one of the best actors on the planet today and probably ever. Talk about having big shoes to fill. Acting clearly runs in the family though, as John David has already made quite a big name for himself after being the lead actor in two very successful movies that I thoroughly enjoyed, Spike Lee’s BlacKkKlansman (2018) and Christopher Nolan’s Tenet (2020).
So yeah, Washington was definitely the main attraction for me when it came to Beckett, and although I didn’t love the film as a whole as I’ll discuss more in depth shortly, I was very pleased with Washington’s performance. I thought he did an amazing job at playing the “man-on-the-run” character of Beckett and really showcasing all of the emotions that character was dealing with throughout the manhunt. He also shined when it came to all the action sequences throughout the film. I thought they were very well-done and I’m sure all of Washington’s practice with the action scenes in Tenet paid dividends when it came to this movie.
Lastly, I really liked the way the film looked overall. I thought the shots of the mountains in Greece were beautiful. It also did a great job of capturing the chaos of the city of Athens when the film reached its climax, which I thought was a nice touch.
THE BAD
Unfortunately, there were a lot of things that I did not like about this film. The one thing that stuck out to me like a sore thumb from the first fifteen minutes of the film was that this felt like something we have seen before in terms of the overall story and that’s exactly what it was. It was just your typical couple on a vacation who turn out to be in the wrong place at the wrong time and must go through holy hell to get back home safely.
While there is nothing wrong with those kinds of stories because as mainstream as they are, they can still be entertaining to watch, but that just wasn’t the case for me when it came to Beckett. I just wasn’t a fan of this particular screenplay, the story felt convoluted and confusing so many times and the film’s pacing didn’t do it any favors. I think the main reason for me feeling that way was because they were just trying to hit on way too many themes in this and they ultimately didn’t execute on any of them really. For example, they had international politics, the corrupt government officials, kidnapping, incredulous heroics, and just all of these other subplots that made the story pretty messy. I don’t know, I just wasn’t all that enthralled with this movie, which is the total opposite of what I should be saying after watching an action thriller.
Easily the most frustrating part about this movie was just the underutilization of the other characters, specifically Beckett’s girlfriend April (played by Vikander) and Boyd Holbrook’s character, CIA employee Stephen Tynan. I really think this movie had a lot of potential despite the poor screenplay just because of the names attached to it. I mean for anyone who has seen the 2017 superhero film Logan, in which Holbrook plays the antagonist just like he does in Beckett, we know how good he is at being the bad guy, and I understand this is different from a superhero movie, but I just wanted more from his character.
As for Vikander, we just didn’t get to know anything about her character April, in large part because of her ridiculously quick demise (not really a spoiler), but all we learn about April is that she likes to look at strangers and creates backstories on them. I was also shocked by how there was absolutely no chemistry between Washington and Vikander as a couple, but I think that all goes back to her limited screen time. I even think that if they were to show some flashbacks of their relationship, it would’ve helped both their chemistry and the overall movie, but they didn’t do that and it just annoyed me to see two talented actors/actresses be underutilized like they were.
THE VERDICT
Despite some great action sequences and a solid performance from John David Washington as a man on the run, Beckett fails to captivate the audience with its far-too familiar story, an overabundance of themes, poor pacing, and the underutilization of its talented cast.
TED TAKES RATING - 5.8/10
Beckett is now streaming on Netflix. Check out the latest trailer below.