American Ultra (2015)

Gripping story with well-crafted characters

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

Eisenburgs emo virgin character was only slightly annoying when he was actually young enough to play it. But he's 35 years old and this ridiculous, spineless character he's playing got old about 30 seconds in. Half a movie later, it's still there. Couldn't watch any more.

American Ultra is one of those films that can be summed up in a single sentence: PINEAPPLE EXPRESS meets BOURNE. Yes, it's a stoner comedy with all of the idiocy that premise brings to light, mixed with a gritty action thriller in the JASON BOURNE mould. I suppose it's only good for showing that any actor - even someone like Jesse Eisenberg - can be turned into a skilled martial artist with camera trickery and snappy editing. Sadly, although this film is gruesomely violent, the fights are disappointing and the plot is so silly as to be not worth mentioning. Add in the presence of Kristen Stewart - a detraction in any film in which she appears - and you have a film with simply isn't worth your time.

Stoner and slacker Mike Howell (Jesse Eisenberg) spends his days getting high and writing comic books, but what he doesn't realise is that he is actually a sleeper agent who was part of an experiment by the CIA. When Howell is targeted for elimination by the CIA, his handler Victoria Lasseter (Connie Britton) decides to 'activate' him much to the annoyance of her colleague Adrian Yates (Topher Grace). With the CIA and their top agents hunting him down, Howell must use all of his skills to the best of his ability in order to survive...American Ultra is a mishmash of films with elements of The Manchurian Candidate, The Bourne films and practically every stoner comedy in existence. With the right handling this could have been great, but it's all rather ho-hum to be honest...I'm not generally a huge fan of stoner type comedies because often they are rather lazy and repetitive (there are some exceptions such as Harold and Kumar), and in this respect American Ultra is fairly weak as well. The stoner dialogue between Eisenberg and Stewart is lazy and uninspired and pretty dull - there's only so many times that you can hear words 'Dude' and 'Man' in the same sentence before it starts to become irritating. I presume the stoner aspect of Howell's life is the 'comedy' aspect of the film, but to me none of it was funny and as I mentioned it was more annoying than anything.Even taking out all of the lame stoner dialogue and focus on the story itself then the film still isn't that great; for a start I found that a lot of things here weren't very well explained or didn't make much sense. For example Howell is a sleeper agent and the CIA have targeted him for elimination and this seems to be based on the fact that Howell wants to leave the area?? Now presumably the reason for this is that the CIA may be worried about losing him or perhaps they want to keep an eye on him in case he somehow regains his memory (this is all speculation as nothing is really explained). I just didn't understand why he needed to be killed? Even if he moved out of the area, what difference would it make to the CIA as Howell didn't know he was part of an experiment nor did he know anything about his past life. Alternatively, if they wanted Howell to remain in the area why not put a directive or program in place to suppress his desire to leave? I know I'm throwing up a lot of scenarios and problems, but when a narrative is as vague as this one it feels as though you have to work everything out for yourself...Still it isn't all bad Eisenberg and Stewart make a likable enough couple (even though the former is annoying and is basically the same as he is in every film). Stewart on the other hand is much better; her performance is more natural and believable and she does give the picture a slight lift - also to her credit she didn't annoy me anywhere near as much as Eisenberg. The supporting cast are all OK, but I can't imagine that this film will really be the high point of anyone's career. That said though, some of the action sequences are pretty good and the film has just about enough energy to make it watchable, but when the chips are down there aren't enough funny moments for the 'comedy' aspect of the film to work and the narrative is a little vague and isn't interesting enough to make it a particularly involving experience. It passes the time, but that's about it.

Mike Howell (Jesse Eisenberg) is stuck in the small town of Liman, West Virginia. His girlfriend Phoebe Larson (Kristen Stewart) is the only good thing in his life. He's a convenience store clerk and has panic attacks whenever he tries to leave town. CIA Agent Victoria Lasseter (Connie Britton) is told that her Ultra program and Mike is to be eliminated by her CIA rival Adrian Yates (Topher Grace). Victoria goes to activate Mike turning him into a skilled action hero.The basic premise has good potential and Eisenberg could be fun as an action lead. The CIA stuff is distracting and Topher Grace is barely functional in his role. The movie would improve by cutting out half of that part. The potential is never fully realized. There are fun moments that could have been much better. I can't pinpoint the exact problem but much of the blame has to be laid at the feet of sophomore director Nima Nourizadeh who made the indie party movie Project X. There are numerous little problems that add up to be a bit of a disappointment.