Polar (2019)

Directed by Jonas Åkerlund. Starring Mads Mikkelsen, Matt Lucas, Katheryn Winnick, Vanessa Hudgens, Fei Ren, Ruby O. Fee, Anthony Grant, Josh Cruddas, Robert Maillet, Richard Dreyfuss, Jill Frappier, Lovina Yavari.

Relentlessly ugly, one-note abomination believes that over-the-top brutality and tongue-in-cheek sadism is entertaining unto itself, and so no one bothers to give any of it shape, meaning or context. In a role that he is way too overqualified for, Mikkelson plays an aging assassin nearing retirement, but his boss (Lucas) has no interest in paying out the millions he owes him, so the creep sends out a team of perversely barbaric killers to snuff the guy out (big mistake). A migraine-inducing assault of sniggering shock tactics and clunky, pseudo-hip dialogue, slathered over a squishy miasma of grotesque violence—all of which is meant to be, like, so cool—punctuated by moments that are so casually hateful that they risk leaving the viewer feeling unclean and depressed. Gratuitous through and through, without even a scintilla of human interest or real feeling; the only “innocent” character in the whole movie (played by Hudgens) is just a plot device prop, and only appears onscreen in a handful of scenes. If the exercise hadn’t been so rampantly unpleasant, it could have squeaked by as shallow escapism, but any slim hope for redemption is stomped to a pulp long before the irrelevant denouement. And just what the heck is Richard Dreyfuss doing showing up for an extended walk-on? Adapted from a graphic novel by Victor Santos. Johnny Knoxville cameos in the opening scene.

6/100