Low budget action films have been a staple of Hollywood since the early days. Get a larger than life personality to throw a punch or two, or fire off a gun whilst explosions go off behind them, and you've got a recipe for success even if it's not going to be Oscar worthy stuff. There have been a lot of stars loved around the world not because they're great actors, but because they managed to entertain with some ridiculous action movies. And with the resurgence of 80's nostalgia it would seem like this might be the perfect time ton go back to those schlocky, fun-loving movies; and this is what Gunner seems to be trying.
Gunner stars Luke Hemsworth, the eldest and lesser known of the Hemsworth brothers, as Lee Gunner, a decorated US Marine who's trying to put his home life back together after a year of him being missing; a year in which his eldest son died. Despite having won the Medal of Honor and being recognised as a hero, he's struggling to reintegrate into his family, trying to rebuild his relationship with his two surviving sons. Gunner decides to take the two of them camping in order to bond, and to help straighten out his eldest son Travis (Connor DeWolfe), who he finds in a post drug haze in his girlfriends bed.
Despite Travis being unwilling to go camping, a quick parachute drop out of a plane and some ATV driving starts to bring the family together a little bit. However, when they stumble upon a remote drugs lab in the forest and their uncle is killed by the criminals, things go terribly wrong. With Gunner's sons taken hostage he's given a deal by their leader, Dobbs (Mykel Shannon Jenkins), steal their drugs back from the authorities, and Gunner gets his sons back. Instead, Gunner decides to hatch a plan to break Dobbs' father, played by Morgan Freeman, out of prison to trade for his sons.
Gunner has a ridiculous plot, but one that feels no more silly than half of the action revenge movies of the 1980's that made people like Arnold Schwarzenegger a star. The military veteran caught up in a world of crime and having to save a family member is such a common trope that it's basically it's own genre now. What lets Gunner down isn't necessarily the plot or the writing, which is also quite cliched, but the lack of budget and the lacklustre effects.
Low budget doesn't have to be a bad thing for action films, and you can do a lot with less, but Gunner seems to have spent its money in some odd places, and made some unusual choices in the action scenes. There are a number of times in the film that the action is broken up by long slow motion shots as new enemies walk onto the screen and Gunner sizes them up. This, coupled with some rather slow feeling punches and physical action makes the fight scenes feel sluggish and bored. The film also employs a lot of digital effects for muzzle flashes and blood spray, but doesn't exclusively use them, leading to scenes where you're never sure when the practical affects are going to suddenly change to digital.
When an action films action leads you to feeling bored there's not a whole lot that the film has going for it at that point. The inclusion of Morgan Freeman does mean there are a few scenes in the film that feel a little bit classier, as he brings a gravitas to the film that it probably doesn't deserve, but with him being in the film for all of ten minutes it's too little to save things. It also leads me to wonder how much of the small budget went to paying for a star name, and led to cheaper effects being used elsewhere.
Another part of the film that felt odd to me, and immediately jumped out was the use of subtitles. Now, this wasn't done because people were talking another language, these subtitles were used when an Asian henchman was speaking English. The subtitles were also large and filled half the frame, presented in a 'artistic' way rather than the traditional method. The man speaking was perfectly understandable, and whilst his voice was accented it never prevented me from being able to know what he was saying. This choice instead smacks of casual racism that I've seen done in American media before where perfectly understandable people with accents are given subtitles.
Gunner is a low budget, paint by numbers action movie that could have been a lot better. With some tighter, more exciting action, or a bigger inclusion of Freeman the film would likely have been more entertaining than it was. As it is, this is a movie that is fine if there's literally nothing else to watch and you don't really want to be challenged to think, as even hardcore action fans might struggle their way through this one.
Gunner is released digitally in the UK on 9th December 2024.
