Polar

2019, Jonas Åkerlund (Lords of Chaos, lots and lots of music videos) -- Netflix

Music videos still exist? Where is our late night half-hour TV show that highlights the charts?

Anywayz, from a director whom I am not surprised he did Ramstein videos, and a very very very loose connection to John Wick (Constantin Films, production company, helped distribute Wick in Europe) comes a very very very over the top movie that tries to resurrect the visual appeal of 90s edgy action flicks while melding it with a Suicide Squad aesthetic. But it stars Mads Mikkelsen, which is the only reason I forgave it.

So, first up. There is no real reason this movie is called Polar other than that the original web-comic / graphic novel is called that, and it is sometimes a wintry movie. The Miller-ish comic looked incredible, and did its best Sin City impression using snow and shadows to set a mood. Parts of this movie take place in a cabin by a lake in the heart of winter, but it's nowhere close to being polar.

Anywayz.

Holey fricking crow, this movie was all over the place. Mads is soon-to-retire assassin Duncan Vizla haunted by one kill from his past, that must have gone wrong. He will retire to his rustic cabin in the woods in small town Montana/Wyoming/Dakota/Somewhere with Snow and Mountains, and live off his well-earned pension plan. Yep, Damocles the Assassination Company has pension plans. You would think assassins would just make so much money, they could set up their own offshore money, but psss-shaw, we need a premise. And that premise is that the owner of Damocles has been squandering the money, so his ingenious plan is to kill his own assassins as they turn 50, so the clause in the contract means all their banked money goes to him. And he uses a gawdy, inclusive band of not-near-50 assassins to take out his own veterans.

The movie flips between Vizla's attempts to retire, or prepare to retire, in his cabin in the woods, across the lake from almost unrecognizable Vanessa Hudgens whom he has taken a shine to, to gory, over the top killing scenes as the Band of Younger Ne're Do Wells take out the random people at Vizla's Other Addresses. The colours and imagery are drastically different between the two types of scenes, which are well directed and shot, but quickly become tiring. The thing that made John Wick work so well was that it was tonally solid and knew who it was. This movie is suffering a major split personality.

And the sex. Edgy 90s tried to pull away from the politically correct late 80s with lots of racy sex. But this movie just seems to be yelling "BOOBS !" every ten minutes, for no particularly good reason. An extended sex scene between Sexy Bimbo Assassin and Vizla may be based on the scene from the comic, but it goes much further than it needs to. Why?  Just because.

And don't get me fucking started on it's extreme "FUCK YOU!" to John Wick when Vizla brings home a puppy. I almost turned it off right there.

In the end I watched it through, and despite some incredibly well shot scenes and decent acting (I loved every clothing change scene with Katheryn Winnick [ed. note: that's not what it sounds like; i mean she wore a diff outfit in every scene.]) it just didn't win me over.