Assassin Club

Assassin Club

A single thought can be given for the damned who chance upon the cheaply made action movie “Assassin Club,” which arrived straight to video (DTV) and may lurk at some far-reaching streaming platform (or maybe just the Walmart discount bin). That description does get across what a wearying journey this thriller is, in which a young hitman (“Crazy Rich Asians” leading man Henry Golding) travels around the world while trying to find and kill whoever has put out a million-dollar contract on his life. But even those who are least demanding of genre films should expect more than “Assassin Club” this is bottom of the barrel stuff, but it’s not even good enough for that.

The idea behind this film, like the film itself, is simple enough. Golding plays Morgan, an ex-Marine sniper turned contract killer who wants to retire and start fresh with his girlfriend Sophie (Daniela Melchior), though he’ll have to complete one last job first, and it’s of course too good to be true: six bad guys worth a million dollars each.

Morgan realizes that his other six targets are also killers when they start going after him oh yeah, and there’s a bounty on his head. To find answers, Morgan goes after the mysterious “Falk,” the only person among Morgan’s six targets whose identity remains unknown. Also chasing down Golding’s character is conventionally short-tempered Interpol Agent Vos (Noomi Rapace). Intrigue should ensue but it doesn’t.

“Assassin Club” staggers from plot point to plot point between tiredly executed yet occasionally lively action scenes; everybody hits their marks choreographers, stunt people and on-screen performers alike but too often the cameras don’t do them any favors. Golding stands out only for how hard he works at making something out of nothing with his thinly drawn character.

It may still say something that the most interesting parts of Morgan’s journey are related to his mysterious broker/mentor Caldwell, played with a little twinkle in his eye by Sam Neill. Morgan thinks he’s been betrayed by Caldwell because Caldwell has always set up jobs for him, and also has convinced Morgan that he’s only killing bad people so it doesn’t feel like a huge shock when Morgan finds out Caldwell lied about who those six targets were.

The mischief Neill brings to these scenes may give one pause maybe Caldwell is right when he insists that he isn’t really betraying Morgan? Maybe that gives “Assassin Club” some depth? But no, the movie isn’t interested in wrestling with what Neill and his character bring to things, and Neill’s performance goes away with him once he exits.

More time is given over to Agent Vos, who works her way through various supporting characters with a plot-pushing head-scratcher of an accent that sounds like a Southern hick crossed with a Lithuanian cabby. Then there are the other killers whom Morgan is supposed to be hunting down. The movie never fully exploits their defining quirks either, which makes it harder to root for Golding’s put upon hero as he reacts against pulpy foils like Yuko (Sheena Hao), a man-hating martial artist, and Anselm (Claudio Del Falco), a finger-collecting psychotic.

Golding doesn’t invest a lot into his character, but it’s not like that helps his scenes with Melchior, which are completely devoid of any chemistry. And he can’t quite figure out how to make Morgan seem like a tough guy with soul. He winces as his character stabs a syringe into an exposed neck while driving a stolen ambulance during a choppily-edited and visually-boring car chase.

He also snarls into the telescopic lens of his sniper rifle during his between gritted-teeth recitations of William Butler’s Yeats Death, which Morgan has randomly made his pre-sniping mantra. Golding tries hard enough, but I never bought that he was some kind of highly skilled assassin with all the stock character trimmings, including a concerned-but-clueless romantic partner, possibly traitorous business partner, and peculiar Interpol agent trailing after him too.

To be fair, star power and character development might not matter for someone watching “Assassin Club.” The formulaic pleasures of this kind of high concept project sometimes outweigh its creators’ low energy execution.

Then again, DTV action movies only really differentiate themselves from their A or B-grade competition once their creators’ have leached off some special X-factor quality to compensate for their usual lack of other attractive qualities like an original style or some marquee topping leads or visual effects budget. You don’t need any of that stuff to make a good enough genre exercise. But you do need more than a committed cast of B+ (at worst) stars. “Assassin Club” leaves its cast out to dry between underwhelming action scenes and draining expository dialogue.

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