Since the news of the upcoming Parker film (and possible franchise) broke, several people have asked me what I thought of Jason Statham in the part.
I didn’t have much of an opinion. As previously noted, my only experience with Statham was in Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch, both of which were ensemble pieces where he was not top billed, and both of which I haven’t seen in a decade or so.
I figured I’d better get educated, so last weekend I decided to put myself through Statham 101. I rented three Jason Statham movies, two of which are his most famous (to me, anyway), and one of which was recommended by Brian Drake in the comments. They were: The Transporter, Crank, and The Bank Job.
The Transporter is incredibly stupid but highly enjoyable. It reminded me of the heyday of the action hero in the ’80s and early ’90s, when my buddies and I would go see Arnold or Van Damme flicks knowing full well that they would most likely be crap but also knowing we’d most likely have a good time for an hour and a half on a Friday night. I miss movies like that, so while I don’t know that I’ll rent the sequels, I enjoyed The Transporter more than it likely warranted.
Crank is also incredibly stupid, but much less charming. It encapsulates all of the worst traits of recent low- to medium-budget actioners (in my experience–I quit watching them for a reason and as a result am not highly educated in the field). It’s the classic D.O.A. plot mixed with heaping helpings of Run Lola Run, video games and the movies based on and influenced by them, Tarantino without a whit of his wit, and some unpleasant sleaze played for laughs. I can’t say I was bored, but I didn’t like it much.
These films told me little about Statham’s ability to play Parker–Statham was competent in roles that didn’t require much beyond that.
* * *
The Bank Job is another story altogether, and if you haven’t seen it, you should. Forget Statham and Parker for a moment–The Bank Job is a damn good heist film that anyone who likes that sort of thing (and you do, else you wouldn’t be here) should enjoy. Rather fancifully based on the 1971 Baker Street Robbery, The Bank Job is the story of a big-time heist that ends up much bigger than its ambitious protagonists could have possibly imagined. Well-plotted, well-written, well-acted, and suspenseful, The Bank Job was an extraordinarily pleasant surprise.
And, more important for the purposes of my Statham self-study, it gave the man a chance to act.
What did that reveal? That he can.
Statham looks the part of Parker. No, I don’t mean that he’s an exact match of Richard Stark’s description–I don’t particularly care that Statham doesn’t have hair and Parker does. Statham’s physical presence and aura of toughness fit the feel of Parker, and that’s what matters to me.
But portraying Parker properly requires more than just looking the part of a tough guy. Parker’s emotional range is limited, which means that on-screen, a poor actor would just be boring–he wouldn’t be able to put across the subtle menace and the intelligence below the mostly stone-faced surface. This is likely why adapting the literary Parker has only really been attempted once, in the director’s cut of Payback, and even that take threw in a couple of humanizing elements.
Can Statham pull it off? Very possibly. He’s quite convincing in The Bank Job as a working class stiff with options that don’t at all match his ambitions. He plays tough, tender, and troubled, and does fine at all three. Parker will be a step up from The Bank Job, but not nearly as big a step as it would have been from The Transporter.
He may just be able to do it.
Afterthought: My biggest concern with Statham is his accent. Parker is so much an American character that I will have a difficult time not being distracted if he speaks like Jason Statham. Can he master an American accent? Will the producers consider dubbing him if he can’t?
Bonus 101s:
J-Lo 101: Watch Out of Sight if you haven’t seen it. She can do it if she tries.
Michael Chiklis 101: If you haven’t watched “The Shield” yet, you need to.
Almost anyone reading this site will like, quite possibly love, both Out of Sight and “The Shield.”
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I’ve seen Statham in both Cranks and The Bank Job, but nothing else. I think he’d make a fine Parker based on those roles, and by the fact that Parker really doesn’t have to say that much. I think UK actors are much better with American ‘accents’ than the other way around, so I’m not that worried about Statham grunting out Parker’s limited dialog. I think he has the chops. Also, I agree with your assessment of Out Of Sight and The Shield. Good shows indeed!
I actually kind of thought Statham would be a decent enough Parker based off the beginning of the Transporter alone. The whole deal with his rules and business like approach to things seemed just a hair or two close enough that I could see him working for a guy who maintains that professionalism for longer than the first 30 minutes.
No way would they dub him just because he does a terrible accent. Seeing a non-Statham voice come out of him would be way more distracting to everyone seeing the movie than him not sounding enough like a book character they’ve never heard of.
In the script Parker has a british accent.
I still would prefer Clive Owen, and we know HE can pull off an American accent. BTW, to see both of these heavy-hitter actors going at it in the same film, watch for “Killer Elite” coming this Fall. Also stars Robert DeNiro. Should be worth the price of admission.
I hope they do it right this time….next to Convoy, my least favorite Peckinpah film, and the original cast and concept had so much promise….Caan and Duvall (Parker connection) in their heyday…..alas…
I think the upcoming Killer Elite has nothing (bar the title) in common with the Peckinpah film. Seems to be a dueling hitmen film, with DeNiro as the mentor to the “good” killer (Statham).
@Tony: you are correct. The new Killer Elite film is a completely different story. No relation to the Peckinpah film from the 70’s with James Caan and Robert Duvall.
Ultimately, it comes down to how willing Statham is to play the character as cold-blooded and utterly without conscience. We know he can play tough and ruthless, and concerns over his size and accent will disappear if the film is well made. But is he – a professed fan of the books – willing to forego even little humanizing touches like some manufactured romantic tension with Lopez’s Lesley or a shoe-horned backstory about why he’s not REALLY such a bad guy and just play Parker as Parker? Moreover, is the studio willing to bank on a potentially franchise-launching film whose titular “hero” is an amoral sociopath?
A better indicator than the films cited above is CRANK. Though the movie itself is broader and quirkier (at times lapsing into straightforward black comedy) than a Parker film should be, Statham’s fairly reprehensible Chev Chelios is sympathetic only by virtue of the fact that the people he’s after are much worse. Based on that performance alone, I’d say he has both the chops and the lack of ego necessary to play Parker.
(Ignore CRANK 2, however, which is awful beyond description!)
As long as the script is good and the suits don’t insist on making Parker “more heroic”, this should work.
I agree with Don; I can forgive the accent and physical discrepencies if he plays Parker as written–cold-blooded, amoral and ruthless. I have to say, I really kind of liked the other Parker films, except Made in USA and The Split. Of course, the re-cut version of Payback was superior to the 1999 version, and I even liked certain aspects of Slayground, although it’s plot had little to do with the novel. But the definitive screen Parker has not been filmed. I really hope Statham and Hackford do the series justice and many sequels follow. A realistic hope? Who knows.
Actually, the closest to Parker I’ve seen film-wise has been De Niro in Heat and Keitel in City of Industry.
A couple of concerns for me are IMDB’s description, which indicates that Parker is a thief who “only steals from people who don’t need the money”, and reports that Nick Nolte is playing Parker’s “mentor.”
IMDB is notoriously inaccurate, and at least one person who claims to have read the script says the character adheres to no such moral code. We all know that Parker doesn’t give a damn who he steals from, so let’s hope that IMDB description is a mistake made by whatever marketing lackey was in charge of getting the IMDB entry posted. I don’t want Robin Hood; I want Parker.
The “mentor” business could also be a misunderstanding. Nolte could be playing Tom Hurley (who sets Parker up with Melander & company in the first place), or perhaps Handy McKay (if the filmmakers plan to mix-up the timeline of the books for the sake of creating a long-running franchise). In order to fill out Nolte’s role, the screenplay might have Hurley be a past associate of Parker’s who actually takes part in the heist because he needs one last score to retire on. If that’s the case, odds are he’s in on the double-cross after the bank job, and will therefore get a more personal death than Melander, Ross, and Carlson. Though that’s a bit of a rehash of Statham’s version of THE MECHANIC, it would still make for a satisfying payback scene that would in no way undermine the overall film/characterization. As long as Hurley and Parker aren’t too chummy in the beginning…
According to a producer of the film Nolte is playing Melander. Also the humanizing touches will probably be with Claire only.
sorry I meant Nolte = Hurley.
Yeah, I was assuming that Michael Chiklis was Melander (though he’s certainly not what I pictured when reading the book!), so Nolte would almost have to be Hurley – assuming the film is faithful to the novel. My fear, however, was that Nolte might be an entirely new character, added to make Statham’s Parker a little more sympathetic. Good to hear that this isn’t the case!
This looks pretty bad. There are pics of Statham wearing a cowboy hat on the set. I don’t think Parker would EVER wear a cowboy hat. Just for that alone I might have to cancel this one. And he’s gotta be American, no accent. Although he does have the intensity down. But maybe too much intensity, the dude always looks like he’s gonna explode. Parker is more controlled. Dave, you are right on about Deniro in Heat, pretty close to Parker. Actually Michael Mann would’ve been a good director for this.
I feel that the closest we’ve ever seen an actor get to Parker’s inhumanity, his coldness was Javier Bardem in No Country For Old Men. His character in that film was way darker than Parker but he had the right presence, emotionally and physically.
J-Lo was great in Out Of Sight but that was a long time ago. There’s always a possibility she might pull it off. But if the two characters hook up at any point? Forget about it.
It’s going to be a disaster. Creatively and probably commercially as well. And of all the novels that could have been adapted, why Flashfire? Arguably the least typical and least impressive Parker novel–I liked it, and it was the first one I happened to read, but it’s not by any means the best place to start.
But worst of all–Taylor Hackford. One of the most sentimental directors of all time. The guy who remade “Out of the Past” and gave it a wistful romantic ending with a sappy Phil Collins song in the background.
No, this one’s doomed, folks. Statham isn’t the real problem. Not a great choice, but he could have worked. But they have the wrong director, the wrong book, an badly chosen cast overall (Nolte’s just going to serve as a bitter reminder of how good he could have been as Parker a few decades back), and most likely a crappy script.
I wouldn’t be surprised if this one makes us nostalgic for “Slayground.”