My Review

When a new Vin Diesel movie is released reviews tend to lean more towards mixed to negative reception with the adjectives being “dumb, loud, big, ridiculous, preposterous, and fun,” thrown around liberally. I would agree completely with every word in the description above, but fun should be the main attraction the movie should go for, because I don’t know of any person on the face of the Earth who goes to a Vin Diesel movie, because of the acting, characters, or story. They go for the action, corny one liners, and debatable charisma of Diesel (I don’t think he possess much, but the Fast & Furious franchise has proved me wrong. His current project is just what you expect from his regular films minus the usual enjoyment.
Bloodshot is about a United States marine Ray Garrison (Vin Diesel), who has recently just returned home after completing a successful rescue mission in Mombasa. He is immediately greeted by his fiancé Gina (Talulah Riley). The next day Ray and Gina are ambushed by a group of mercenaries led by Martin Axe (Toby Kebbell) demanding to know the source of the Mombasa operation. Ray pleads that he does not know when Axe threatens vicious torture upon Gina. Axe becomes agitated by his lack of results and kills both of them with a gunshot to the head. Ray is later resurrected by Rising Spirit Tech, a company that specializes in developing cybernetic enhancements for disabled US military personnel. The CEO, Dr. Emil Harding (Guy Pearce) informs Ray that he is the first successful candidate to undergo the experimental nanite technology. Additionally Ray is introduced to other patients and former military personal of Dr. Harding including: KT (Eiza Gonzalez) who Ray forms a platonic bond with and has a reconstructed pair of lungs, Jimmy Dalton, (Sam Heughan) who has mechanical eyes, and Marcus Tibbs, (Alex Hernandez) with robotic legs.
Ray begins to get accustomed to his new life as Harding explains that all of the people on the base are their because of his experimental procedures and their loved ones or family did not claim their bodies. For all intents and purposes there are considered dead. Ray starts to have visions of his death in fragments and proceeds to take revenge on Axe and all others who robbed him of his former life.
So as you can surmise this film appears to be very formulaic and predictable. It is, safe for one twist I did not see coming, mostly because it does not make sense in relation to the characters and left me scratching my head immediately after it was revealed. I will leave you to discover it as it may provide you with some thrills in a movie which lacks them. Bloodshot’s main deficit is that he is not really interesting and there is nothing the screenplay adds that makes the viewer care or sympathize with him.
He is pretty bland, but Vin Diesel excels at playing emotionless blank slates. Here his acting is basically non-existent, he is playing Dom from the Fast & Furious franchise down to wearing signature “wife beater” tank top, the way he talks, acts, emotes, and mannerisms. Everyone else in the cast is average, but what I am really wondering about is Guy Pearce and Toby Kebbell. Both very versatile and respectable actors. Pearce who excelled in roles such as L.A. Confidential, Memento, The Proposition, and The Rover is known for disappearing into his characters as you can witness by watching another of them mentioned films. But here he is wasted in a real nothing role, which I think he took in order to settle a bet, make a down payment on new property, or was dared to by a friend and decided “what the hell.” Kebbell while not processing as much range has been effective in movies such as the Planet of the Apes films and Destroyer appears to be channeling a vicious psychopath, who does a little jig to a song I will not name, but livens things up when he and the song are one. But other than that he is an extended cameo that the trailers falsely claim he has a bigger part in.
Directed by David S. F. Wilson in his first feature length film appears to have no interesting flourishes to emend Bloodshot with, but I am not sure he could do much since I am not familiar with the character and the baseless screenplay by Eric Heisserer (who has done vastly better with Arrival and worse with A Nightmare on Elm Street remake) and Jeff Wadlow (Blumhouse’s Truth or Dare and the universally panned Fantasy Island movie update). Vin Diesel produced this and while it is not as ego driven as the Riddick series (In the film Riddick a character states she is a lesbian and Diesel’s character retorts “we’ll see about that.” And ends up having sex with her at the end of the film. I guess he is so good looking and charming that he is able to get people to change their sexual orientation in the blink of an eye. Despite this being utterly ridiculous and quiet offensive), it still makes the character seem near indestructible. On a more positive note the movie is pretty quic