I’d like to thank everyone whose been sticking with me during these reviews that I do, hopefully they’re still good to you readers, because I still really enjoy doing them, and honestly they probably won’t stop… I GOT THE FEVER! well other than actually having a cold, and being hopped up on Buckley’s, its just fun to write and create a discussion panel for film. But again thank you for the support and the continuous views you guys have given me, as of today, I’m sitting at 506 views, and 206 visitors! Which is crazy to me, when I was given the idea from a family friend and her daughter to start a movie blog near July-ish, I laughed and said, “psht no one would want to read what I would have to say,” i’m happy to say I was wrong!
Release Date – October 13, 2016 – Thursday late night showings, official release is October 14th.
I think I randomly saw this trailer pop up on a YouTube Movie Trailer page, I saw two names I was fond of, Ben Affleck and Anna Kendrick, so immediately I knew I was in. The trailer didn’t show to much, but left me wanting more. We knew that Ben Affleck was playing some super smart individual, who was gifted in more ways but one. We gathered from the trailer that he was a bit off centre and weird, that left me wanting more. That and the perfect use of “Everything In It’s Right Place” by Radiohead in the trailer, I knew that this movie would be interesting.
The Accountant is an Action, Crime, Drama film about a math savant (Affleck) who is hired by a company to go through their financial records to find out where millions of dollars have been moved to. The treasury department closes in on the activities of Affleck, and the closer they get to him, the body count increases.
The Accountant is directed by Gavin O’Connor, who isn’t extremely well known yet, but I think after a couple more films, people will really start to take notice. He is a great director, who does very subtle camera movements that make his style unique to me. His filmography consists of such films as Miracle (2004), Pride and Glory (2008), and Warrior (2011). His IMdD page also states that he has 6 other upcoming projects that are in the works. I’ve liked this guys direction ever since I saw Pride and Glory (2008) which I thought was a very interesting cop thriller, full of twists and turns and really great acting. I was super interested in seeing Warrior (2011) after enjoying Pride and Glory (2008), because I wasn’t super into the UFC, but I liked the actors and I knew that under the umbrella of O’Connor that it would be a really interesting flick to watch, which it was. Warrior became probably my top 3 favourite movies of that year, just a very incredible and emotional story, driving by great performances by Joel Edgarton and the one and only Mr. Tom Hardy. If you haven’t seen Warrior, you owe it to yourself to see it, because DAMN. Anyways The Accountant was a very uniquely shot film, O’Connor really likes his different styles of framing his shots and you can tell by the way he moves his camera very subtly, that he has a gift. The sequences of action were especially well shot, I saw a few things in this film that I haven’t really experienced in other action movies, whether it was a weird camera angle, or the use of different inanimate objects as lethal killing tools. I was really blown away by how this film was shot and directed, but the movie is only as good as its script and I thought the script was well written.
The script was written by Bill Dubuque, whose only other film was The Judge (2014), which I haven’t watched quite yet. My best friend messaged me over the Thanksgiving weekend asking if I’ve watched it yet, and I said I hadn’t but wanted to and she said I would really enjoy it, she knows me quite well so I’m intrigued to check it out. Even more so now that I know that the same script writer did The Accountant. The script was full of really intense sequences, and even funny and clever writing. There were parts where I was genuinely on my the edge of my seat, but other parts where there was actually funny moment. There was a nice balance between great action and comedy. The script was great.
Where this movie really shines is in its acting, and how could it not with such a stellar cast. Ben Affleck plays Christian Wolff, who was brilliant. I find that Affleck is a fine wine, that his talent gets better as he ages. I especially enjoy his directing, and writing, his acting has gotten a lot better, but when Affleck is in the driver seat, and doing the trifecta of acting, writing and directing, you know that you’re in for something special. Affleck’s filmography includes such films as Dazed and Confused (1993), Mallrats (1995), Good Will Hunting – Wrote and starred (1997), Chasing Amy (1997), Phantoms (1998) – (Affleck was the bomb in phantoms, yo!) , Armageddon (1998), Dogma (1999), Jay And Silent Bob Strike Back (2001) Clerks II (2006), Gone Baby Gone -Directed (2007), State of Play (2009), The Town – Directed/Co-Wrote/Starred (2010), Argo – Wrote/Directed/Starred (2012), Gone Girl (2014), Suicide Squad (2016), and Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice (2016). I’m super excited for his take on the next solo Batman movie where he is writing, directing and starring as the cape crusader, and he has another film out in January that he’s written/directed and is starring in called Live By Night that looks great. I thought he did a great job acting in this movie, he played the part very well, and even had the mannerisms down pat. He also was very stoned face the whole time, like zero emotion, nothing, just all business.
Anna Kendrick is in this movie as Dana Cummings. Her filmography consists of such films as The Twilight Series (2008-2012), Up In The Air (2009), Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World (2010), 50/50 (2011), ParaNorman (2012), Pitch Perfect (2012), End of Watch (2012), The Voices (2014), Cake (2014), Into The Woods (2014), Pitch Perfect 2 (2015), and Mr. Right (2015). I thought she did a great job in this movie, she was up to her generally quirky ways, but did a great job and had great chemistry with Affleck. I always think of her of a great actor, and I believe that one day she’ll be taking home a best acting oscar.
J.K. Simmons is also in this movie, who has quickly became one of my actors to look out for, after his amazing portrayal of Fletcher in Whiplash (2014), which is a movie that blew my mind, stay tuned for that review which is on my list to do before the directors next film La La Land, that comes out before the end of the year. Simmon’s filmography consists of such films as The Jackal (1997), The Cider House Rules (1999), Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man’s (2002, 2004, 2007), Oz TV series (1997-2003), First Snow (2006), Juno (2007), Burn After Reading (2008), Up In The Air (2009), I Love You, Man (2009), Whiplash (2014), Terminator Genisys (2015), and he’ll be in Damian Chazelle’s next film, La La Land with Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling. I think that Simmon’s is a very good actor, and has a lot of diversity in his roles, I’ve never really seen him play the same role twice, except for Spider-Man but he was a recurring character.
Last but not least, Jon Bernthal wraps up the main cast in this movie. Bernthal is known for such roles as World Trade Center (2006), The Pacific TV Series (2010), The Ghost Writer (2011), The Walking Dead TV Series (2010), The Wolf Of Wall Street (2013), Snitch (2013), Fury (2014), Me and Earl and the Dying Girl (2015), Sicario (2015) and he was also The Punisher in the second season of the Netflix Original series – DareDevil, and will continue to play The Punisher in its own series that is coming to Netflix. I wasn’t a huge fan of Bernthal in The Walking Dead, probably because I was supposed to hate his character, Shane. But after his Walking Dead stint, he’s really been picking up speed, and has been choosing a lot of good roles as of late. He’s definitely one to keep an eye on.
I thought the acting in this movie was superb, no faults there.
The negatives I have towards this film, are very minor, but still I think they should be discussed. I thought the 3rd act in the film kinda fell flat. There was a lot of steam, and a lot of build up, but I felt like the final bit of the movie was just okay. It was like they hit the brakes a little too soon, and what I expected wasn’t what was going to go down. Plus there was a twist in the film, that I called about halfway through, which is fine, I guess I see a lot of movies. But that is where the film kinda hit a low for me. It seemed like a slow burn, with a big pay off at the end, but it was a slow burn, with a cool execution but the payoff wasn’t spectacular.
Overall, I give The Accountant a 4/5.
Definitely if you’re in the mood for slow burn, interesting action film, give The Accountant a go. Its like if John Wick, Jason Bourne and A Beautiful Mind, made sweet love and had a child, this movie would be the child.