The Hitman's Bodyguard (15)
★★★

THE latest in a long line of mismatched buddy action comedies teams up Ryan Reynolds and Samuel L Jackson for a couple of hours of giddily irresponsible, relentlessly hyperactive and unashamedly ridiculous violence.

We follow elite bodyguard Michael Bryce (Reynolds) who, two years after a client is assassinated on his watch, finds himself downgraded from triple-A status to protecting a middle management businessman in a ramshackle, especially pungent car.

But soon Michael finds himself tasked with protecting and transporting charismatic hitman Darius Kincaid (Jackson) who, in return for the release of his wife Sonia (a hilariously foul-mouthed Salma Hayek), has agreed to testify against notorious Belarusian war criminal Vladislav Dukhovich (Gary Oldman) at the International Court of Justice in the Netherlands.

In a style that evokes everything from the Robert De Niro/Charles Grodin classic Midnight Run to the Mark Wahlberg/Denzel Washington vehicle 2 Guns, it basically consists of Reynolds and Jackson bickering their way from Paris to The Hague, with enough faceless baddies getting shot and cars blowing up around them to give the John Wick franchise a run for its money.

While the script by Tom O’Connor (Fire With Fire) lacks the level of witty dialogue that you might need for something like this amid a plot that doesn’t really amount to much beyond what’s predictable, the chemistry between the lead duo is entertaining and sparky enough to make their mismatched journey consistently entertaining.

Reynolds fulfils the sarcastic, exasperated straight-man role very well, while Jackson is clearly having a ball as the wildly over-the-top Kincaid, who seemingly uses his signature motherf****r more times in this single runtime than he has in his entire career. Together they play up to their already established Hollywood personas really well.

You never quite know if the film is playing its hand straight as a throwback to buddy action movies of the past – Lethal Weapon, 48 Hrs and The Last Boy Scout are also firmly among its influences – or if it’s slyly winking as a send-up of that kind of thing. Choose a lane and it can be enjoyed as either, but as a combination it can feel a bit like it’s trying to have its bullet-ridden cake and eat it.

Director Patrick Hughes (The Expendables 3, Red Hill) fills his film with all manner of over-the-top set pieces; chases through small European streets (in cars, motorbikes and speedboats alike), a violent tussle in a DIY store (no nail gun or axe gets left on the shelf) and an oddly romantic flashback showing Kincaid looking on besotted at his future wife beating up a bar full of drunks in Mexico City.

Every so often the extended set-piece-after-set-piece mentality is interrupted to remind us that oh, that’s right, there’s an actual plot going on involving the trying of a war criminal and the need for Bryce to forgive his former lover and government agent Amelia (Elodie Yung) for something she denies.

But it never gets anywhere close to properly handling those aspects – let’s face it, that’s not really what we’re here for. It works best when it keeps things turned all the way up to 11.