Assassination Games
Specs
Title: Assassination Games
Genre: American action film
Director: Ernie Barbarash
Writers: Aaron Rahsaan Thomas
Producers: Justin Bursch, Brad Krevoy, Patrick Newall
Release date: July 29, 2011
Production company: MediaPro Studios, Rodin Entertainment
Distributed by: Samuel Goldwyn Films, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
Country: United States
Characters: Roland Flint, Brazil, Polo
Setting: Bucharest, Romania.
Synopsis:
Two rival assassins get together in order to eliminate the head of a drug cartel - Polo. Brazil is a contract killer and Roland Flint remained psychologically damaged after a drug dealer left his wife in a coma but not before raping her while Flint watched helplessly. When both heard about the bounty put on the drug dealer's head, whether it is money or revenge that motivates them, the rivals join forces to take out the target.
Personal view:
Dilapidated architecture (Casa Radio), organized crime, prostitution and poverty are the clouds surrounding Romania in sepia tints. Those denote nothing but backwardness and a return to the past. The chaotic architectural structure is perpetually emphasized. The abject, downtrodden buildings, which once upon a time enjoyed the aristocratic reputation, they now succumb to the window-glass skyscrapers of the banks.
Bucharest reflects through the director's eyes right from the start through the luxurious wedding party at "Samovar Club" where most guests speak ... guess what? Even the singer booked for the party, Loredana Groza, performs in Russian, what a delight! Even though Romanian security was roaming the place, they were nevertheless incompetent comparing to the heroic figure of van Damme.
Moving on, we have the amazing British hitman, Flint, caring for his comatose wife in a medieval-looking like room. Nonetheless, we also have to keep an eye open for the tremendous gap between Flint's English and the broken accent of Romanians.
Images with gypsies roaming the streets, entangled electric cables everywhere and of course poor Romanian beggars will not be absent from the picture, right? Romanian hookers cannot be left out of the action either, how they are wondering about the ruined buildings of Bucharest! The female gender stereotypes is either helpless old women with kerchiefs or young mistresses in short skirts strolling the streets in the freezing cold weather. It's always this climate that's emphasized in a country like ours, Saul Bellow suffered from it too in the Communist Romania.
Not much has changed though, Russian mafia doing its biddings freely here, torturing innocents, throwing late-night parties with seductive Romanian escorts and even the local police watches helplessly when confronted with the two assassins and the Interpol. The officials are caught in the middle of gunfire and it is the drug cartel leader Polo who snaps them back to reality shouting "Do your fucking job". Moreover, Flint defeats the bunch of them singlehanded.
Last but not least, Romanians are fascinated with the Americans, and this is emphasized with by the needy, abused concubine of a gypsy. Brazil gallantly saves her from the pimp and falls in love with her, but predictably, the girl gets brutally killed, her death being the key element who helps van Damme's character rediscover his spirituality and faith at the end. For the American and British assassins, this journey was not only another job from which good money will come, or an opportunity to revenge, but we also see a personal rite of passage like Stowe exemplifies through Rebecca West and Edith Durham.
