DVD: The Gunman

The first face seen in The Gunman belongs to Sky News presenter Dermot Murnaghan. In a seemingly real broadcast, he says “the Democratic Republic of Congo is the scene of the worst humanitarian crisis in the world.

The conflict is fuelled by the country’s vast mineral wealth, with all sides suspected of deliberately prolonging the violence to plunder natural resources.” Genuine footage of conflict, starving people and the mines in question accompany this commentary.

According to The Gunman, the 1990s civil war was sparked by the assassination of the country’s minister responsible for mining. As exploitation of a real conflict, this is a breathtakingly contemptuous peg around which to build a film. Murnaghan’s report was specially filmed.

The fictional assassin was Jim Terrier (Sean Penn), ostensibly in the Congo as a private security contractor. Some years after the killing he is back in the country as an aid worker, attempting to assuage his guilt. Local baddies suddenly appear and are after him. Who is employing them? Who wants to wipe him out? On the run, he leaves Africa hunting for allies and answers. Shadowy forces are at play. Multi-national companies are pulling strings. Terrier is tough, but he is troubled.

Javier Bardem sleepwalks and Mark Rylance is vaudevillian

The Gunman draws on Jean-Patrick Manchette’s 1981 book La Position du Tireur Couché, about a hitman who wishes to retire but cannot. The film is directed by Pierre Morel, who was behind 2009’s similarly world-traversing actioner Taken. The Gunman’s co-writer is Penn, who is also credited as a producer.

Building the film around Penn was therefore inevitable, and there are hints of his 2005 thriller The Interpreter. But he is wooden, has barely any facial expression and acts with the naturalness of a wind-up toy. But he does frequently take his shirt off to display his muscles. The other actors are poorly served. A good-humoured Ray Winstone has a “what-am-I-doing here?” air. Javier Bardem sleepwalks. Mark Rylance’s absurd turn is vaudevillian and Idris Elba may as well not have been cast as he barely appears. The love interest is Jasmine Trinca’s medical professional Annie. Inexplicably, she sticks by Penn’s Terrier as he kills, and then continues killing. With crushing sexism, her cardboard character is blinded by a love rendering her unable to see that Terrier is eminently avoidable.

Should more need to be known, this home cinema release includes seven extras: four short explanatory pieces and three interviews. Although not seen, Penn is lauded in all. Making a bad film is forgivable, as is making sub-Bourne clap-trap. But making one which cynically inserts its fiction into appalling episodes in recent history for entertainment purposes is distasteful and inexcusable.

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Overleaf: watch the trailer for The Gunman

Watch the trailer for The Gunman