Runtime: 107 minutes
Directed by: Gareth Evans
Starring: Tom Hardy, Jessie Mei Li, Timothy Olyphant, Forest Whitaker, Luis Guzman
From: Netflix
Another unpopular review from me, at least in some people’s opinion. The reason I even subscribed to Netflix again: to see the new movie from Gareth Evans. No, not the guy that directed the 2014 Godzilla and The Creator. This is the guy that directed The Raid movies plus created the Gangs of London TV show. The first Raid was incredible, an amazing theatrical experience. I hated the story in the second Raid and the action was just too preposterous & too overblown. As his Safe Haven segment in V/H/S/2 had the main faults that Havoc did… the crushing realization that most of Gareth Evans does is a turn-off is a heartbreaking realization.
Tom Hardy is a dirty cop who is involved in a kerfuffle of a situation… actually, who cares about the plot? I didn’t really like it myself. I know what many will think was my problem with the movie—no, it wasn’t the excessive usage of F-bomb, although that did sour my mood right away. My main problem was HATING Hardy’s character and despising how unpleasant this universe was; if it wasn’t for the hope of some epic action, who knows if I would have even watched the movie in full! Another issue: the entire movie is full of green screen backdrops—with rare exceptions they looked uniformly terrible.
The opening action setpiece was exciting despite the computer graphics as the aesthetic wasn’t bad. While preposterous, at least that was fun. Unfortunately, besides the despicable lead character, the movie is just ugly-not just visually, but also in tone. It was a convoluted story full of dour, a literally dark world. When it took ages for the action to return, that only further soured my mood. The action we got was way over the top, which can be fun—it wasn’t here when I couldn’t wait to escape this world full of unlimited bullets and guns that never need reloading.
Many people will be satisfied with this movie; a shame that Havoc was such a massive letdown for me, aside from hearing the new Tom Hardy accent. Oh, and in Netflix’s infantile wisdom, the movie is set during Christmas yet was released in April. Not a surprise for a streaming service I may not subscribe to again for ages. Their CEO is bellowing about movie theaters being “an outdated concept” yet for years have created plenty of braindead “entertainment” even worse than the majority of wide release movies during the same time period, giving the middle finger to great filmmakers by refusing to finance them, etc. How about I give a middle finger to Netflix…
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