SPOILER-FREE PLOT SUMMARY
Set in 2022, retired United States Army Special Forces soldier Michael Connor (played by LaMonica Garrett) is on a video call with his adopted niece Riley (Rosmary Yaneva) in the Ukraine when the Russian military storms in and takes everybody hostage. Desperate — and knowing she’s wearing a smart watch — Connor calls his old Army buddy Charlie (Jason Patric) for help locating her. He agrees to help Connor get into the Ukraine via a covert group of military mercenaries going into the country for a different target. After having landed in Kyiv, Charlie hands Connor off to his man on the inside, a local named Dany (Andrew Howard), who agrees to help in exchange for getting his wife and two kids safely relocated. With Charlie supporting from afar, Connor and Dany must locate Riley before her smart watch dies, thereby losing their lead. In the meantime, Russian commander Koniev (Daniel Bernhardt) intercepts communication between the two Americans and discovers their plan. Can Connor get to his niece in time? Will Dany’s family make it out of the country? Are Connor and Dany enough to take on the entirety of the Russian force alone?
SPOILER-FREE REVIEW
Using the real-life backdrop of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, director and co-writer William Kaufman delivers an excellent addition to the military action genre with MAN OF WAR. Too often in this category — especially with a military flavor — the flow of action feels contrived and scripted. Kaufman provides the opposite here, a natural-feeling, easily digestible rhythm, and that’s a welcome change.
Nice touches of writing are showcased, for example, by showing how Riley knows her way around a gun during a minor stand off so, when she picks one up a bigger one later, any possible doubt is removed from the audience before it forms. But there are a handful of minor issues that would’ve been nice to clean up.
Why are Russians speaking to other Russians in English while Ukrainian’s are speaking Ukrainian to each other? How does a Russian fighter miss a wide open target in the woods after specifically waiting to attack the group because they didn’t know he was there? Why does a sniper — who has a bad guy in his literal crosshairs — not pull the trigger on an immediate threat holding a rocket launcher? These are all conveniences for the story to move along and/or to embellish the drama that will see points deducted every time.
As far as performances go, Garrett is a solid lead but Bernhardt is terribly cast as the main antagonist. For starters, he doesn’t have Russian features so I never once believed he was a Russian officer. Secondly, he’s got some menacing moments but his character wasn’t fleshed out enough to really make an impact. Is Koniev an unstoppable force that’s equal to the man hunting him? I don’t know, maybe? We, as the audience, are asked to believe so during his limited screen time but there’s no real reason or backstory given to truly believe it (other than he has no problem slowly, ruthlessly slicing a man’s throat open). Other than that omission, the rest of the supporting cast is believable and you openly root for Connor to make it in time to save Riley.
All in all, it’s not over-the-top (see: WAR MACHINE), it doesn’t fall short of it’s potential (see: SEVEN SNIPERS) and it’s not overly long (see: AGENT ZETA). MAN OF WAR is just an enjoyable action movie that deserves your attention if you’re looking for something off the beaten path.
JKG SCORE: 6.5 out of 10
Untitled Film Project 