Henry Brogan is an elite assassin who becomes the target of a mysterious operative who can seemingly predict his every move. To his horror, he soon learns that the man who’s trying to kill him is a younger, faster, cloned version of himself.
Will Smith has always been a great actor, see “The Pursuit of Happyness,” “Ali,” and “Six Degrees of Separation” for proof of that. But even in his action films, “Bad Boys,” “Independence Day,” “Men in Black,” and “Enemy of the State,” he always manages to bring charisma and appeal to those projects so it is almost impossible to dislike the man. “Gemini Man” is no different, even though Mr. Smith’s character, Henry Brogan, is an assassin, we are told early on that his job requires him to eliminate bad guys who deserve their punishment so we immediately side with him, even though his actions would be condemned by many.
Try as he may, Mr. Smith just can’t elevate “Gemini Man” above mediocrity. Even with a top-notch cast including Clive Own, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Benedict Wong, and Ralph Brown, and Oscar-winning director Ang Lee behind the scenes, the overall narrative falls flat as we have seen comparable stories told with better conviction; “Moon,” “The Island,” and “Logan,” to name but a few. The problem here is that while the movie tries to inject originality into a clichéd plot, everything else, from the action to the characterizations to the unescapable finale, all feel familiar. We have seen it before in more competently-told films.
Mr. Smith plays Henry Brogan, an elite assassin who works for a clandestine government agency that eliminates terrorists around the world. Henry’s skill as a sniper is unmatched and he is considered the best in the business. When he discovers that a job he just completed and the man he killed, wasn’t actually a terrorist but was working on a top-secret project with the Russians, he hands in his resignation. Wanting to try and live the rest of his life without taking any more lives, he retires to his home in Georgia. Danny Zakarweski (Mary Elizabeth Winstead), who works for the same agency Henry just retired from, is tasked with observing him but he makes her and her cover is blown. Just as they are about to go their separate ways, they are attacked but between them, they manage to take out the entire killer squad.
Henry calls in a favor from his old Marine buddy Baron (Benedict Wong) and the trio head to Cartagena in Colombia to lay low for a while but soon after arriving, Henry is attacked by a strange man who seems to be able to anticipate his every move, and vice versa. When the two men finally come face to face, their resemblance is uncanny and Henry quickly learns that his old boss, Clay Verris (Clive Owen), took a sample of his blood over twenty years ago and through top-secret experiments, cloned him. When he informs his younger self of this, he refuses to believe him and the two men resort to a vicious and brutal fight with both sustaining injuries and his younger self, named Junior, managing to escape. Henry realizes that Clay is using his lab to work on more classified ventures and comprehends that he must return to the US to take him down. When they reach Georgia, Junior unexpectedly sides with them, stating that he has come to terms with who he is and wants to make sure that Clay is put out of commission, permanently.
Everything about “Gemini Man” screams pedestrian. The opening scene in which Henry and Danny’s houses are attacked are intense and exciting but sadly, that’s the film’s highlight. There is a motorbike chase in Cartagena comprising of Henry and Junior but it is easy to see where CGI was utilized for some of the scene’s most exciting elements and it was used quite a lot, making you wish the filmmakers took a page out of the Jason Bourne movies and shot everything in-camera, without the reliance of CGI. There is a fight scene in Budapest between Henry and Junior but it is nothing to get too excited about, there have been better-executed fight scenes in far-superior films. The de-aging effect used on Will Smith is surprisingly good but you find yourself staring at Junior and not for what he is doing or saying but because you know he’s not real and occasionally, the effect seems to slip a little, taking you out of the picture, which is not the desired effect. Even Clive Owen’s antagonist is uninteresting and prone to outbursts of stereotypical villainous monologues, complete with all-black wardrobe and the occasional menacing close-up, they should have thrown in an eye-patch and maniacal laughter, just to round him out. In the end, Mr. Smith, at a sprightly 51, proves that he still has what it takes to compete with the younger generation of up-and-coming action stars, just not his younger self.
Now available on Digital HD and on 4K Ultra HD, Blu-ray, and DVD January 14th
