A WORKING MAN Review: Jason Statham Rampages Against Human Traffickers

Jason Statham's characters may change professions, but not types. Whether a farmer, shop hand, or driver, he's invariably a man with a deadly past, one that's usually tied to special forces.

In A Working Man, Statham is Levon Cade, manager on a construction site for a company owned by Joe Garcia (Michael Peña). We can see his skills in the opening scenes when he takes out a dozen bad guys threatening one of his workers, using nothing more than pickaxes, nails, and bags of cement.

The bad guys vow to return, but they must be waiting for a sequel. The script — by executive producer Sylvester Stallone and director David Ayer — has more pressing issues. Single dad Levon's about to lose custody of his young daughter Merry (Isla Gie) to her dissolute grandfather. Then Joe's daughter Jenny is abducted by Russian traffickers.

Risking his right to custody of Merry, Levon vows to find Jenny. He turns to blind war buddy Gunny (David Harbour), whose cache of military-grade weapons will come in handy later.

Levon heads to the bar where Jenny was last seen, working his way up the trafficking ring by torturing or killing opponents. "You'll wish I was a cop," he tells one underling before waterboarding him into submission.

The missing girl, reluctant hero, and perverted villains place this firmly in Stallone's universe, with Taken and The Equalizer references thrown in. By the time Levon encounters drug-dealing bikers headquartered in a massive honky-tonk, it's like watching an Expendables episode without the costars.

Which isn't a bad thing. Last year's The Beekeeper suffered from self-aware dialogue about "hives" and performers playing their roles for laughs. A Working Man is all about business, apart from some treacly scenes for Gunny and Merry.

Ayer, who also directed The Beekeeper, keeps the story moving briskly, no matter how ridiculous the plot twists. Especially in the early scenes, Statham spends much of his time waiting in a car for victims to show up. It's the kind of writing where the best way to sneak into a casino is by crashing your motorcycle through a window.

It's easy to blame Ayer and Stallone for the script's shortcomings, but it's actually based on Levon's Trade by Chuck Dixon, a graphic artist who worked with Stallone on Expendables comic books. Dixon has written a dozen Levon Cade novels so far, which Stallone had originally planned to turn into a television series.

Set in Chicago, A Working Man was filmed in England, adding to the movie's visual disconnect. This is a Chicago with convenient alleyways and suburbs with rolling hills instead of houses. Apart from the always dedicated Peña and the barely there Harbour, the cast is nondescript.

Statham, however, is in top form. Whether chased through swamps by ATV's or singlehandedly attacking a Russian mob summit, he delivers just what his fans want. In the over 20 years since The Transporter, almost no other action star has performed with his consistency and skill.

The film opens today, March 28, only in movie theaters, via Amazon MGM Studios.