Metacritic reviews

Wrath of Man isn’t as blatantly funny as “The Gentlemen” is, though it has its laughs, but it is taut and exhilarating without a single wasted moment.

Wrath of Man is a slick action thriller from writer director Guy Ritchie, where retribution is only half the story.

At under two hours, however, the pulpy entertainment is welcome, including a bevy of twists that recall the recent (and slightly better) Den of Thieves.

Wrath of Man passes muster for its mayhem and mise en scene, a good-looking but unfussy film that may not work its flashbacks in as gracefully as you’d like, breaks into “chapters” that do nothing for its flow, yet makes its violence and vengeance as grimly gripping and visceral as any Ritchie had put on the screen.

Cacophony eventually takes over Wrath of Man, stranding the actors in the process. Except, that is, for Jason Statham, who’s by now a master of presiding over Guy Ritchie’s gleeful chaos.

Wrath of Man finds Ritchie in a moody midlife mood, his urge to be quirkily unpredictable now contained, even as his camera still swings around, going backward, ahead or soaring above. There is menace, a dull darkness and stillness, as if he’s watched “Heat” too many times.

The film is better at punching the clock than punching the bad guys. To that end, it’s an honest day’s work from Ritchie and Statham, but not an especially entertaining one.

Ritchie mostly moves his mixed bag of pieces around the board with flair, showcasing his well-rehearsed knack for gnarly violence and chaos, giving us a sinewy B-movie that warrants a watch on a screen bigger than the one in our homes, another welcome shot of adrenaline for us and for the industry. I’m craving my next dose already.

The ultimate sin of Wrath of Man is that it doesn’t realize it’s really a story about pride.

Wrath is just another loose bag of lizard-brain thrills and wood-block dialogue: too ugly to be camp, too grimly familiar to feel new.