UNLEASHED REVIEW

So is Unleashed the best American Jet Li film? Or is the star-heavy casting that includes Morgan Freeman and Bob Hoskins an attempt to hide yet another middling action film's played out pretensions?

UNLEASHED
Rogue Pictures
103 min Rated R strong violent content, language and some sexuality/nudity.

A big rumor is that this is Jet Li’s finest US film. A quick review of IMDB would suggest that even if you’ve never seen any of his American films such rumors are probably true.

I haven’t encountered a more complete entertainment in a long time but oddly enough it’s the very concentration on entertaining the audience that holds Unleashed a.k.a Danny the Dog firmly in the genre film category. This is character driven but at its heart Unleashed is a martial arts action film. The real question, especially since this film was produced by Luc Besson who appears to have had a heavy hand in the end product, is whether or not this film deserves to be mentioned in the same breath as Leon The Professional. I’ll stay out of such debates for now but offer the opinion that Unleashed is a magnificent ride that I will gladly take again

The plot for anyone not yet aware concerns Danny, an Asian man who has been trained to be a human dog by a heartless crime lord who uses him to discipline those who are late paying back loans. Utterly obedient, unable to do more than obey simple commands and highly skilled in the martial arts Danny is a virtual machine, killing anyone he’s told to once his master removes a special collar. Pay up on time and the collar stays on, fail to pay and the collar comes off.

When not being used as a human battering ram Danny lives an abject life. Kept in a cage with a few meager possessions, fed scraps and kept in rags he knows nothing else except for brief, sometimes violent glimmers from his childhood. When Danny finds himself unexpectedly free and in the care of a blind piano teacher and his daughter he awakens into personhood only to find himself and his new family pursued by his old master.

Unleashed’s broad stylistic brush, well developed characters and unlikely but thrilling action reminded me a lot of Besson’s Leon with its simple setup involving types of characters. Instead of the killer with a heart of gold and the father-daughter dynamic Unleashed offers a wise blind guide, a cold hearted crimeboss with idiot underlings and an innocent manchild. There are also a host of others who are more or less there to provide a reason for Danny to fight but that and an exceedingly simple plot merely provide the springboard for director Louis Leterrier to make pure movie magic.

The fights are stunning. Danny is every bit as ferocious as the plot would suggest and the camera brings that terrifying rage to life with dynamic motion. We never feel robbed of the energy but we get far more than simple static shots. Instead we’re in the middle of the mayhem, feeling fear and fury in equal measure. By the time Danny is collared again we’re grateful to have some breathing room.

And just as tight as the film’s visual virtuosity is its script. The audience I was with laughed constantly. Danny’s inexperience with the outside world, the bombastic quality of Bob Hoskins' constant upbraiding of his thugs - “Did I ask you for a validation?” he says at one point - and the dry observation of an elderly office worker who says of Morgan Freemans’ predecessor, “Last fellow we had was so drunk he wound up tuning the plumbing - terrible mess.” Such moments are played for laughs but they are woven around and emerging from characters that are worthy of laughing at, or with, thanks to the stellar cast.

Certainly an action film has rarely ever had a cast this distinguished. Besides Li’s nuanced portrayal, Morgan Freeman forces humanity out of what could easily have been a charicature. And Bob Hoskins is simply the most powerful screen villain of the last couple of years. He rages, foams, lusts, threatens, and kills, even lies and cries at the world around him becoming utterly alive in a way that few screen villains ever are even for a moment in their movies. It is simply one of Hoskins best performances even if he is chewing the scenery.

Of course Unleashed builds to a key moment. As Danny does unlikely things like taste ice cream for the first time, learn how to read and emerge more or less whole from what must have been a soul scarring existence we are aware that his one real weakness is his fear of the master. What is scarier, discovering himself and the outside world in all its good and bad or being collared again and forced to admit that he is and always will be a dog in need of a master? Don’t go to see Unleashed expecting to have your hand held but don’t be afraid to be led either. Leterrier and cast know exactly when they want you to laugh, to think, or feel a little twinge of sweetness. But they also know how to knock the breath out of you and make you cover your eyes. Unleashed offers a beautifully controlled look at an out of control situation.