"A Working Man" Review

 Just a year after the sleeper hit of The Beekeeper, director David Ayer and star Jason Statham are back with A Working Man, based on Levon's Trade, one of a series of novels by comic book writer Chuck Dixon. While The Beekeeper was a bonkers mess while being entertaining, this time we're given a bog-standard revenge flick which while it knocked off Disney's disastrous Sand Brown Snow White in the box office in its second week, it won't be remembered in Statham's Pantheon of action classics.

 Statham plays Levon Cade, a grumpy ex-Royal Marines commando working as a construction foreman for Joe Garcia (Michael Peña) in Chicago. He has a young daughter, Merry (Isla Gie), who lives with her grandfather, Dr. Jordan Roth (Richard Heap), who blames Levon for his daughter unaliving herself after a lifelong battle with depression. He is seeking to further restrict Levon's limited visitation time because he has PTSD & is a violent killer, though that's what soldiers do in war.

During an evening of clubbing with friends, Joe's daughter Jenny (Arianna Rivas) is kidnapped. Joe begs Levon to help, offering $70,000, but Levon demurs saying he's not that person anymore. But after about five minutes and a visit to a blind war buddy, Gunny (David Harbour), he changes his mind and embarks on the quest to find Jenny, working his way through Russian mobsters and various underworld lowlifes.

If you've seen any Unstoppable Killing Machine On A Revenge Mission movies, you can pretty much guess how A Working Man goes on its discount Taken plotline. The problem is that the script by Ayer and Sylvester Stallone (whose producer credit indicates he was developing this for himself) is in need of heavy editing and streamlining to pick up the pace. We are separated from Jenny for so long at times we almost forget what Levon is after.

The way he tries to pick up the trail by dealing with biker meth dealers slows the pace. He calls another war buddy who works at the DEA for some info and we never hear from him again. An opening scene where armed thugs rough up a worker at the construction site and Levon steps in to deal the hurt has zero ramifications. And the ending seems like it wants to set up a sequel of some sorts when there's little left to this story. Even the introduction of the grandfather dressed like a Jamiroquai cosplayer isn't explained and how that allows him to look down on Levon.

Statham is Statham in pretty much every Statham movie - grumpy bald Brit with hints of a soft center under his iron fists. At 57, he's beginning to slow down - he was 34 when he shot The Transporter and his peak heyday was in the Aughts. It doesn't help that Ayer covers the action with too close framing and reliance on shakycam. After John Wick revolutionized action coverage, there's no excuse for poor fight work.

 To be punny, A Working Man is a workmanlike movie. Not bad, but not as good as it could've been with substantial tightening and a sharper focus. With a dozen novels so far in the Levon Cade series, they'd clearly like to make a franchise of this, but they'll have to get better quickly to succeed.

Score: 5/10. Catch it on cable.