The best action movie of the year came early in 2024
03.01.2024 - 15:37
/ polygon.com
/ John Wick
/ Best
Every few years, a new action movie recalibrates expectations for the genre. It happened in 2011 with The Raid: Redemption, it happened in 2014 with John Wick, and it’s about to happen again with Mayhem!, the new revenge thriller from many of the people behind the brilliant first season of Gangs of London.
Mayhem!, whichfirst made waves at Fantasia Fest under its original title, Farang, will be released in U.S. theaters on Jan. 5. Director Xavier Gens, action designer and second unit director Jude Poyer, and star Nassim Lyes have created a kinetic, violent experience that delivers what fans want from this kind of R-rated actioner. Camera movements in perfect concert with the action plus fluid, grounded choreography performed by a former national champion kickboxer combine for a mesmerizing experience that easily would have been the best action movie of 2023 if it had come out just a week earlier.
The action scenes are excellent and vicious, deployed sparingly in the first half of the movie and then at great length in the back half. But brutal violence isn’t what separates Mayhem! from other recent revenge stories: This movieexcels because it takes the time to give specificity and details to its principal characters, making the story and its tragedy more deeply felt.
Samir (Lyes) is an ex-con who fled from France to Thailand after a run-in with his former gang. There, he builds a beautiful life with his wife, Mia (Loryn Nounay), raising a child together and saving money to buy land in order to run a restaurant. But Thailand’s laws and a powerful real estate developer get in the way, forcing Samir into a dangerous situation in his attempts to pursue his family’s dream.
Bad guys attack, loved ones die, Samir wants vengeance — you know the deal. This kind of revenge story can be rote; we’ve seen it a million times. But Gens gives this portion of the movie the attention it deserves. Samir and Mia aren’t just the kind of stock idyllic family seen in so many other revenge action movies. Yes, they have a happy life together and are enmeshed in their community, but they have specific jobs (he at an airport, she at a bar) and specific desires they’re working toward together, which makes them feel more like real people. Those goals aren’t incidental to the narrative: They eventually bring Samir and Mia into direct contact with danger.
That gives extra weight to the all-too-relatable struggle of hoping to achieve dreams together, but being boxed out by the rich and powerful. There are effective splashes of action at the start, including a thrilling early chase sequence through a construction site, but Gens and team give this part of the story room to breathe.
And thank God they do, because once Mayhem! turns