The last movie by director Justin Kurzel was “Macbeth” (here’s my review), which marked him as an impressive visual stylist. His latest, based on the popular video games, still boasts impressive visuals, but lacks the narrative heft to make it work. Michael Fassbender plays the last descendant of the Assassins, a secret society that battles the Templars for an end to violence and mankind’s free will. The simplistic plot is one that only a video game could spawn and it’s inevitably peppered with lots of action. Kurzel has created dense imagery (with lots of dust and smoke) and his fights are high-energy, although ultimately repetitive and tiresome. The best thing that I can say about this film is that Fassbinder spends about 1/3 of it fighting and flexing shirtless.
(2 / 5)