Brad Pitt leads a starry ensemble cast through a string of murders on an Oriental express in Bullet Train, a fast-paced comedy thriller that opens strongly but never delivers all the guilty pleasures it promises as a deluxe genre exercise. Directed by action specialist David Leitch (Atomic Blonde, Hobbs and Shaw), who has previously worked as Pitt’s stunt double, this English-language version of Japanese author Kôtarô Isaka’s 2010 best-seller Maria Beetle feels more like a comic-book adaptation than a novel, from its zippy plot and heavily stylised Loony Tunes visuals to its broadly drawn, psychologically flat protagonists.
A sporadically enjoyable but overly laboured exercise in post-modern pulp, Bullet Train opens theatrically in Britain today (August 3) to coincide with its mainland European premiere at the Locarno Film Festival. It then rolls out widely in Australia, the US and other territories later this week, with distributor Sony clearly hoping for a splashy summer blockbuster.
Pitt plays an emotionally troubled assassin, code-named Ladybug, who is currently undergoing therapy to help process his ethical qualms about killing people, often innocent victims, collateral damage that he blames on bad luck and bad karma. Easing back into work with a gentle but lucrative assignment, Ladybug agrees to board a bullet train from Tokyo to Kyoto and steal a suitcase full of ransom money. But this smooth journey inevitably takes a bumpy detour when Ladybug finds the train to be teeming with other hit men and their lowlife associates, including British fraternal duo Tangerine (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) and Lemon (Brian Tyree Henry), vengeful Mexican mobster The Wolf (Benito A Martinez Ocasio, aka rapper Bad Bunny) and The Hornet (an underused Zazie Beetz).
Also on board is The Prince (Joey King), a ice-hearted femme fatale who poses as an innocent schoolgirl in a coolly sociopathic manner that recalls Jodie Comer’s Villanelle in Killing Eve, and tormented family man Kimura (Andrew Koji), who is on a mission to avenge an act of callous brutality against his young son. As lingering grudges and competing agendas erupt into bloody confrontation, it slowly becomes clear that all these colourful characters have links to a fearsome crime lord, The White Death (Michael Shannon), who awaits their arrival in Kyoto for a grand settling of old scores.
With its bickering contract killers, candy-store colour scheme, time-jumping plot swerves and archly retro soundtrack selection, Bullet Train is shooting for the kind of cartoonishly violent, ironic, irreverent, self-aware tone patented by Quentin Tarantino, most notably in films like Kill Bill (2003). A closer modern parallel might be the Deadpool franchise (Leitch directed the second) or the Ryan Reynolds / Samuel L. Jackson action comedy series The Hitman’s Bodyguard, a connection underscored when Reynolds makes a brief audience-winking appearance here, one of several uncredited star cameos..
Alas, while Leitch delivers deftly orchestrated action sequences, screenwriter Zak Olkewicz rarely rises above clumsy comic clowning, boorish banter and confusingly knotty plot twists. His script frequently feels like Guy Ritchie at his worst, a rogue’s gallery of broadly drawn caricatures trading deadpan verbal riffs and macho insults in place of actual wit. A recurring sub-Tarantino joke about Thomas The Tank Engine serving as a profound key for understanding the human condition is cute for about five minutes, but soon becomes tiresome and forced.
Bullet Train climaxes with an actual train wreck, which is way too much of an enticing metaphor for glib critics to resist. In fairness, any film that features Pitt as a dorky stoner assassin is never going to be wholly devoid of charm. This closing section does feature some classy acting flourishes, notably from Japanese screen veteran Hiroyuki Sanada (Westworld, Avengers: Endgame), and from Sandra Bullock in a key supporting role originally earmarked for Lady Gaga. But boy does Leitch make us work long and hard for these rare moments of subtlety, skill and emotional truth. A final-act quasi-explanation for all this pointless carnage is a feast of illogical plot holes, but by this point most viewers will simply feel relief that this noisy, exhausting, overlong journey to nowhere is finally over.
Cast: Brad Pitt, Joey King, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Brian Tyree Henry, Andrew Koji, Hiroyuki Sanada, Michael Shannon, Benito A Martinez Ocasio, Sandra Bullock, Zazie Beetz, Logan Lerman, Masi Oka
Director: David Leitch
Screenwriter: Zak Olkewicz, based on the novel Maria Beetle by Kôtarô Isaka
Cinematography: Jonathan Sela
Editing: Elísabet Ronaldsdóttir
Production design: David Scheunemann
Costume design: Sarah Evelyn
Music: Dominic Lewis
Visual effects: Michael Brazelton
Producers: Kelly McCormick, David Leitch, Antoine Fuqua
Production companies: Columbia Pictures (US), 87North (US)
In English, Japanese
126 minutes
