The Heir Apparent: Largo Winch

Who doesn't know Largo Winch in the France-Belgium-Luxemburg trio (the three countries where the French "BD" or "Bandes Dessinées" are massively published) ? 18 years after the publication of the first comic book, which is itself an adaptation of a series of novels, it HAD to be adapted on screens. After a first - and failed- attempt with a TV show, the real thing begins.

First of all, and that's what most of the fans didn't get, the goal of this movie is not strictly to adapt the comic book series. Some essential parts, characters and actions of the original are missing. The movie itself offers an alternative and more modern version of the series. As a 1st class-fan of the comic book, I must confess I was nicely surprised. The actors are good, so is the scenario, though it might seem too fast. I thus recommend this movie to all those interested by financial/political thrillers, but it is clearly not an alternative to James Bond or Jason Bourne series as I could read over the internet.

This movie is a real mixed big. On the other hand it's one great looking and well directed movie, with a pleasant pace and some good action but on the other it's being a real average one with its story and suffers from some weak acting as well.

It's actually a movie based on a Belgian novel- and comic-book-series. And it's not really hard to see why they wanted to turn it into a movie-series as well. It has a very typical movie style and way of storytelling to it, that reminds you of movie-series such as the Bourne Identity and James Bond ones. It has a thriller type of plot, hot women, plenty of action and hand-to-hand combat and some exotic locations as well. Yet as a movie this one does not really work out quite successfully. Also financially it was a disappointment but that didn't prevent them from making a sequel, with the poetic title "Largo Winch II", in 2011, which was not much of a success either. So it seems that the series is already over before anybody had really heard about it, unless some big Hollywood studio decides to pick it up and turn it into a movie-series, since the potential is all definitely still present in it.

It's a movie in which a secretly adopted son has to proof his legitimacy, in order to take over his murdered father's company, that is worth billions and prevent it from falling in the wrong hands of some shady business people. Doesn't sound like the most interesting perhaps and you're right to think so. It's mostly being a Industrial espionage thriller, with backstabbing characters and ones with double agendas, with some action thrown in it to spice up things. It just isn't really the most exciting concept to begin with and besides, the movie its story offers little new or surprising really. It all has been done before and better as well. It's all quite predictable, also in the way it's progressing.

But the film-makers didn't seemed to be stopped in their ambitions to still create a great movie, despite of its story. It's a real slick looking movie, with a great visual style to it. They also handled the action really well, with some good camera-work and nimble editing. I'm a fan of some good old fashioned hand-to-hand action and this movie has plenty of that. Really, I can't say anything bad about the directing approach of this movie. It also provides the movie with a pleasantly fast pace, which ensures that the movie, despite of its story, won't ever start to bore you.

And the movie also needed a fast pace, since it seemed to be covering lots of ground. It's set in many different countries, at many different places, with many different people. Yet they managed to fit it all into a 100 minutes short movie. It might cause you to loose track at times though. I mean, it's quite hard to understand at times why our main character is suddenly in a different country or how he got there in the first place.

But something that really truly brings this movie down is its acting. Most of the actors really got poorly cast in this and seem to belong on TV or soap operas only really. Kristin Scott Thomas is an exception and Benedict Wong also does a decent enough job but the rest were really struggling to get their lines out convincingly. Perhaps this was also partly due to it that most characters have to speak in many different languages. The movie mostly consists out of French, English and Serbian dialog, while some of the actors themselves aren't even French, English or Serbian. And hearing a French person utter some English words just never really sounds convincing. The lead actor Tomer Sisley was also really struggling with this and only seemed to be in his element during the action sequences.

Not a great movie by any means but still worth giving a go when you have run out of anything else to watch.

6/10

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Now I never read any of the comic about this character so I didn't know what I was in for, no did I ever heard of Largo Winch until this movie came around. But I heard it's a pretty cool superhero flick so I decided to check it out. The thing is, it's a decent B action movie, and also fast paced. But some parts are just skimmed over really quickly without much development. I know the direction is more getting to the core of everything, but there is little to no attachment to any of the characters. They are just mainly there to move the story forward and nothing else for the most part. The movie started off alright but started to lose it's flare after a while, in fact almost a hour of this movie revolves around bunch of people bickering about the company. I don't know if it's because this movie caught me off guard, cause this just wasn't the the type of movie I was expecting and that isn't a positive. This is also a adaptation from a comic book but just didn't have any of the comic book vibe to it. I don't know if the budget for this movie was really low, but from what I heard it's a poor adaptation to the comic and just didn't go in the direction it should have. For a superhero flick or just a comic book adaptation it just seemed like they didn't have the resources to make the adaptation work and make it good. Some even say the adaptation from this comic to a movie if done by Hollywood would have been terrible. I disagree, yeah stuff blowing up constantly gets old after a while but this is one of those movies that needed at least some resources. It also has noticeable plot holes and sequences that make absolutely not sense. This was suppose to be a adventure/thriller but didn't find anything adventurous or thrilling, it's basically below mediocre action movie at most. I am giving this movie a 5.8 because the last 30 minute was sort of entertaining and I liked how almost everything got put together.

5.8/10

Couldn't meet my expectations Largo Winch, a European comic book superhero had caught my attention through its release notes on the movie magazines and its online teasers. I haven't made any research before watching it to keep my curiosity, but when I watched it there was this big slice of the cake was missing: No plot.

The whole movie leans its back against action scenes which are very well worth seeing, at some moments breathtaking and visually drastic. Whereas, there are issues at the technical aspects where cinematography and camera movements lack of quality and proper arraignment. Over the first half of the movie, at the fight scenes and fast paced sequences the camera work was so embarrassing and bothered me a lot. It should have been set up at a better angle. At some of those scenes where the camera movements, location and the angle views are very disturbing that obviously the screen view was like up and down and shaking second by second.

There is one incident happening at the start, that the industry tycoon a Hong-Kong celebrity Mr.Winch was getting killed right at the opening; even while the credits are still showing up. And then there is none... There is one: The son of this industry tycoon who lives separately from his father. Named Largo, never uses his last name in his social occasions, comes to the spot. His action scenes are as rich as a James Bond sequel, the rest is a little Batman-like drama. Whatever means Bruce Wayne for Gotham City is equal in Largo Winch for Hong-Kong. After he takes his deceased father's legacy under his name, he doesn't admit anyone working for him. He takes advises and keeps 8 different financial advisers(one of them are Kristin Scott Thomas) around a round table at his office in a skyscraper, where he goes to his meetings via his personal helicopter and pilot.

Despite all those bubble and guise, money can't buy his freedom; he doesn't admit his fame either. Always knowing what he wants, always taking his own course; he always wins his battles at last. Typically obeying and following all certain rules and clichés of superheros "Largo Winch" never brings out no genuine material:

* He is always right, he never knows nothing wrong. He always makes the right choices; even the choice he made doesn't seem right at first, he finds a new door and gets a second opportunity. * He can go to date and go to bed with any woman in the world, no woman ever can reject him. * His wounds heal very quickly -in just a few seconds, or at least until the next scene-; he never becomes permanently incapacitated nor will he ever die. * He can drive just about any type of vehicle of transportation; he can use every type of tools, machinery and even newly built technological devices; he is very handy and dexterous and is able to fix every mechanic problem. * Either silly or wrong, either rude or slang no matter what he says, no matter what word he spreads out he is always right and has the right of the last saying. No one can ever challenge him to be able to say the last word after him. What have I expected for! What superheroes are for?

I just can't read all those comments. You are complying that this movie isn't similar to Batman, Superman or James Bond? It's very disappointing that US rating is at 6 points. You liked District 8 - strange camera views and shaking hands, You like Tarantino with his time jumping scenes, and You are complain about movie that has both features. For me, Largo Wintch is real. It isn't a guy who uses laser weapons and flying cars loaded witch tons of explosives. He can't fly - it's an issue. He is in jail, and doesn't want to be rescued by cash - money isn't everything - movie says (at least few times). That movie carries a huge emotional load. I think that this film is voted so low, because it doesn't fit to classic Hollywood scenario of action movies like Superman, X-man e.t.c. Largo is to real, so any complaints are about his way of getting out of trouble.

I was enjoying this film from the beginning to the end. It was unpredictable, well played and well showed. At the end, i didn't know that comic book was precursor.